


Mindstorm

by offpanel_archivist



Series: Martian Manlove [42]
Category: DCU (Comics), Justice League of America (Comics)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-01-01
Updated: 2005-01-01
Packaged: 2019-08-20 16:19:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 35,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16559057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/offpanel_archivist/pseuds/offpanel_archivist
Summary: Disaster has befallen the Earth, but where's the JLA?





	Mindstorm

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimers: Characters and settings owned by DC Comics. They've been borrowed for fun, not for profit. Some scenes are directly from said comics as noted in canon notes, with special apologies to Geoff Johns and Joe Kelly for any mangling I've done of their work (not that either of them is likely to FIND this, but please read my twisting of any scenes to fit this scenario as homage to good and interesting storylines from canon, of which there are precious few). Also special thanks to Domenika Marzione, who gave such a compelling explanation of the interrelation of the DC and Vertigo lines in the person of Sanderson Hawkins that I stole liberally from her vision.
> 
> ***
> 
> Note from the offpanel archivist: this story was originally archived at Offpanel.net, which will be closing in November 2016. To preserve the archive, members began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in March 2016. Kerithwyn e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on the offpanel.net collection profile.

Notes: Now regarding the ins and outs of this story:  
The issue here is that I got Jossed. Big time. I plotted this out over a year ago and all the subplots I'd cleverly planned to exploit actually got resolved in canon (how often does that happen?). Canon notes more explicitly identify where I've parted with canon.

Continuity notes: Year 2 of the J'onnverse, set immediately after "Well Met on Moonrise" and "Office Interlude" (you knew that "break" couldn't last). This story can stand alone, but will make more sense if you've read "Fugitive Endeavor," "Setback," and "Globetrotting" from year 1 and "Feeding Pigeons" and "The Apprentice" from year 2. For those who want a quick background, there were impeachment rumblings around the time that Luthor tried to frame Bruce Wayne, but the Supreme Court ruled that telepathic evidence was inadmissible in court. More impeachment talk came when the Daily Planet produced a story claiming that Luthor knew in advance about the invasion in "Our Worlds at War" (the main details of this are in the Superman books in canon). Luthor was let off the hook - ironically - when J'onn did a mindscan and found no evidence of Luthor's foreknowledge. New impeachment talk is circling around DEO and other reports of Luthor's assassination of a man named Masters and revelations about the shadowy activities Masters was up to.

Canon notes:

GENERAL CANON ALERT - We have decided to completely ignore the end of the Luthor presidency as presented in canon (see Superman/Batman #6) because - well, it seemed a little cheap to us. Much of this story helps bring the JV up to date with current canon, although it does so in some places by writing canon out of our continuity.

Part 4 - Perry White fired Clark Kent in Superman #183, when it was revealed he was still in Perry's employ in order to continue investigating Luthor. They agreed not to tell Lois, and Lois remained in the dark until The Man of Steel #134, when she followed Clark to his workspace. In this fic, that didn't happen. Lois still doesn't know.

Part 5 - several lines taken from JLA #72 and 74, with the context changed. Please refer to those comics to see the real scenes.

Part 7 - Kobra's escape taken from JSA #45. Jonathan Kent's odd memory lapses began after he re-appeared after "Our Worlds at War." Canon explained this as a result of a mindscan performed by Manchester Black (see "Ending Battle" running through all 4 Superman books in Nov-Dec '02). Kobra's escape taken from JSA #45.

Part 8 - Mordru's attack on Earth and his recruitment of Eclipso and Obsidian are from JSA #46-47, as is Kobra's terrorist attacks on the cities mentioned. The mention of his effort to keep Poseidonis stuck in a pocket dimension refers to events in "All's Fair," part of year 1 of the J'onnverse.

Part 9 - Mayavana is described and applied in JLA (second series) #39-40. The shadows swallowing New York City and the sandstorm in Manhattan are part of the JSA battle against Mordru, Obsidian and Eclipso as depicted in JSA #46-47.

Part 10 - "Fernus the burning" appears in JLA #86-89. The moon was pulled out of orbit in JSA #48.

Part 11 - Air Wave's distress call is taken from JSA #49. The details of all the stuff happening planetside are from JSA: Princes of Darkness arc.

Part 12 - Airwave's message taken verbatim from JSA #49, as are descriptions of Los Angeles.

Part 14 - The fates of Sentinel, Captain Marvel, Dr. Fate and Jakeem are all from JSA: Princes of Darkness arc. The shadows over New York are from the same issues. The Slab ended up in Antarctica during the Joker: Last Laugh. That was after it had been sucked into its own private corner of time and space compliments of Black Mass. I have taken the liberty of assuming that Mr. Miracle II would be fascinated enough by the occurrence to find a way to harness it.

Part 15 - Significant chunks of description and dialogue directly quoted from Superman: Man of Steel #131 (Shultz) and Action Comics #796 (Kelly). This retelling distorts the actual issues as presented there to fit my agenda, so you should go read the originals. They are the conclusion of an 8-issue arc called "Ending Battle." On Earth developments synched into JSA #50.

Part 16 - Scene constructed around pp.39-41 of JSA #50. Prior to these events, Sand had been thrust back into his sand monster state by the magic of Mordru. Special credit to 'Nika, who has given far more thought to the relationship between Sand and the Dreaming than I ever had and was planting ideas by the gazillions.

Part 20 - Various details of Dr. Occult's activities prior to his entrance into this story taken from a combination of the JSA: Princes of Darkness and past history of the character. Images and events from Pokolistan derived from Action Comics #803-805. Bette Noir's placement in Trapps is detailed in Harley Quinn #23; further history of the character is in Martian Manhunter #3 and #36.

Part 22 - The Elite appear in Action Comics #775. They return for the Ending Battle arc in Superman comics, where Manchester Black is revealed as the mastermind behind the plot against Superman.

Part 25 - The fate of Manchester Black is derived from his canon fate in Action Comics #796.

Rating: R (language, horror imagery and violence)

*****

Mindstorm, part 1By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0"

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

"...nator Duvet has renewed calls for impeachment hearings..."

"Hh," Bruce grunted, his head rising over his knees on the 87th crunch of the morning. "About time."

J'onn floated serenely over the unmade bed as he watched the morning news. "I suspect this may be more political noise than action," he cautioned.

Bruce continued his crunches. "Cynic."

J'onn stretched out and drifted toward the television to turn it off. "I believe that is your role," he corrected mildly.

"There is a remote, you know," Bruce observed, finishing his crunches and rolling into push ups.

J'onn floated lower until he was almost touching the body raising and lowering itself to the floor. "Then I wouldn't have an excuse to get up," J'onn pointed out. He studied the way the muscles bunched and released in Bruce's back, half mesmerized by the ripples in the flesh. He reached down one slender finger, tracing a still healing scar that crossed one shoulder.

The gesture caused Bruce to pause, his arms extended against the floor, and close his eyes for just a moment. "I'm okay, J'onn," he said quietly.

"I know," J'onn answered, brushing a kiss across that same scar. A teasing note entered his voice. "Just wanted to see if I could distract you."

Bruce growled, shifting his weight quickly to take a swipe at the floating Martian and pull him to the ground. 

J'onn grinned impishly as he slipped intangibly from Bruce's grasp and retreated to the bed. "You'll have to-" He broke off suddenly, his face drawn into lines of concern.

"J'onn?" Bruce asked, rising worried from the floor.

But the Martian was already zipping away, and a distant sonic boom shook the windows of the penthouse. Bruce wasted no time, crossing to the workstation tucked behind a hidden access panel. For J'onn to leave so abruptly, without explanation...

*Watchtower. Now.* Abrupt commands, laced with worry and directed at the Bat. And - Bruce noted - three full seconds before J'onn tripped the general JLA emergency signal.

At the sound of the alert, Alfred hastened into the room. "Master Bruce?"

Batman looked up from pulling on his boots. "Watchtower," he explained. "If I don't call back before nightfall, tell Batgirl she has Gotham and see if Robin is available."

Alfred nodded. "Very well, sir."

Batman settled into the upper half of his armor and fastened the gear around his waist. Alfred handed him his cowl and stepped back as Batman reached for something on his belt and shimmered away.

Alfred picked up the discarded pajama bottoms from the floor beside Batman's workstation and quietly re-engaged the security system, closing up the access panel, allowing himself a sigh for a world that could not wait to be saved until after breakfast.

End part 1

***********************

Mindstorm, part 2By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0"

^^^^^^^^

Batman stepped briskly from the teleport platform and met Green Lantern's eyes. "Report."

"Superman. Medbay." The younger man was working the controls of the teleport system, and behind Batman another tube flared to life. "Hold on, we'll go together," he suggested.

The glare of the tube faded and Arthur stepped down. "What's going on?"

"Come on," Green Lantern urged, leading them swiftly toward the medbay. "Something's wrong with Superman. J'onn just showed up with him a couple minutes ago..."

His voice trailed off as they joined the rest of the League in the medbay, gathered around an exam table holding the rigid body of the Man of Steel. Batman took in the clenched muscle stiffness of Superman, the way J'onn stood over him, his hands resting on - no, penetrating - the Kryptonian skull, and snapped, "Computer!"

Behind him, a projection winked on and steadied. 

"...psychic... assault..." J'onn gritted out haltingly in explanation, and Batman noted he had closed his eyes, his face a study in concentration.

"Arthur, see if you can help J'onn. Computer, show Superman's movements in the last 15 minutes."

"He just called up about half an hour ago," Green Lantern offered. "He was fine then."

"Ah!" Arthur exclaimed, recoiling slightly from J'onn.

Diana rushed to his side. "Arthur? Are you-?"

He shook her off. "Fine. Surprised."

"What is it?" Wally asked, staring at Superman with an expression of mesmerized horror.

"Don't know yet," Arthur grunted, reaching for J'onn's arm.

Batman turned his attention back toward the viewing screen, Plasticman sidling up beside him in the shape of a telescope. "What're we looking for?"

Batman stared at the map before him, his eyes tracking the motion of Superman's signal down the West Coast. "Increase playback speed by 3.5," he ordered the computer, ignoring Plasticman.

Behind him, he heard Diana ask, "Arthur?"

"Stop!" he ordered the computer. "Playback the last 30 seconds."

Wally zipped suddenly to join him. "What've you got?"

Batman's eyes narrowed as the replay showed the same abrupt halt of Superman's signal, frozen over a pinpoint on the map. He reached his finger to the spot. "Wyoming," he identified.

"Yes..." J'onn's voice agreed, drawing the attention of the others. "Sorry... trying to stabilize..."

Beside him, Arthur was stock still, breathing with deliberate slowness. Superman remained unchanged.

"Can you fix him?" Green Lantern asked quietly, shades of his youth bleeding into his tone.

"Don't... know.... hold..."

"Do what you can, J'onn. Diana, you and Lantern go check out where he went down in Wyoming. Plasticman, I want you on monitor."

"Batman, I think-" Diana began, glancing back at Superman.

"We don't know what hit him, Diana," Batman pointed out coldly. "You and Green Lantern are the best odds of countering any threat that might be on the ground there."

Diana glared at him for a moment, then followed Green Lantern and Plasticman from the room as Wally zipped in to take her place. "What about me?" he asked.

"Just wait a moment," Batman directed, his eyes shifting to the frozen tableau around Superman. "Chairs, now!" he barked, seeing something beginning to give in Aquaman.

The Flash obeyed instantly, settling a chair under Arthur just as the Atlantean's knees began to buckle. Wally put out a steadying hand as he positioned another chair beneath J'onn.

"Arthur?" Batman prompted, noting that J'onn remained transfixed and unwilling to disrupt him.

There was a whoosh of air as Wally disappeared and reappeared with a pitcher of water - which he upended over Arthur's head.

A sigh of relief escaped the Atlantean monarch and he slumped in the chair.

"I think..." J'onn's voice whispered, and Batman watched as the Martian raised one of his hands from Superman's head and brought it over his face wearily. His other hand brushed gently across Superman's eyelids, closing eyes Batman hadn't realized were blindly, unblinkingly open.

"He's alive," he reassured, catching the chill horror that passed through the room at his gesture. He kept his hand resting gently on Superman's forehead and slowly opened his own eyes. "Arthur, thank you. I am sorry I was not more gentle."

Batman noticed Aquaman nod in acknowledgement, too drained to speak, but his eyes were fixed on J'onn's exhausted features. "What is it?"

J'onn stared down at his lap, and Batman realized that J'onn was floating, his legs fused into an indistinct blur of green. A part of him wanted to cross to him, hold him, but this wasn't the moment. "It is like... a bomb... vicious... it burst into his psyche... shattered his reality. He felt it happening and called out to me. He held on for those six seconds it took me to get there."

J'onn brushed his fingers across Superman's forehead. "Whoever did this wanted him to suffer a psychotic break. Wanted him to start destroying the world ... use him as a weapon. He... didn't let them."

"Man..." Wally breathed, staring at Superman's still rigid body.

"What's his current status?" Batman asked carefully.

"With Arthur to anchor me I was able to stabilize a reality for him." J'onn grimaced slightly. "It's not a pleasant one, but it's stable. I had to seal it..."

J'onn faltered slightly, and Wally reached over to touch him. "You okay there, Green Guy?"

J'onn nodded and raised his eyes to Batman. "I'll recover," he said, although the touch of his mind in Batman's said something else entirely. "I think perhaps it would be wise to get Arthur to his quarters. And maybe..."

Wally, already helping Arthur to his feet, hesitated. "What is it, J'onn?" Batman asked.

"I think it would be good to get Lois here." The words came reluctantly from J'onn's mouth.

Batman nodded, retaking command. "Plasticman," he barked to the room, and the still hovering projection monitor filled with the other man's rubbery countenance. 

"You rang? How's big Blue?"

"Stable. We need you to find the current whereabouts of Lois Lane. The Flash will meet you in the monitor womb in a few minutes."

"You got it." Plasticman stretched across the view screen shaped as a lightning bolt. "See you in a-"

Batman cut the feed with a gesture, and Wally looked at him expectantly. "Help Arthur," Batman directed. "Then you will find Lois. Be discreet, but let her know the severity of the situation. Bring her here."

"Understood," Wally acknowledged. "Ready to move, Aquaman?"

The blond monarch worked to pull himself more upright. "Yes," he whispered, and the two moved slowly out of the room.

Batman watched their slow trek, waiting until they were gone before moving to J'onn's side. The Martian still floated, one hand still on Superman's forehead. Batman claimed the other one. "What's his status?" he asked again quietly, watching J'onn's face alertly and gently running one hand over the curved arc of J'onn's back.

J'onn's mouth formed a grim line. "It's not good. He's aware of us, of what's going on around him, but it has to pass..." J'onn's voice caught, and Batman squeezed his hand. 

"Forgive me," J'onn whispered after a moment. "The attack... it muddled his conscious states, mixed nightmare and reality together horribly. He's still... he's still living it. There's something of him there, underneath it. Something of him here, funneling what's happening around him down to the part of him that kept him from going berserk. But in between..."

"Can you help him?"

J'onn shook his head. "It was all I could do to seal it off... to shut down his motor responses to it." On this last he met Batman's - Bruce's - eyes. 

Batman met his gaze, seeing the haunted feeling in the red depths that stared out at him, the self-horror at having paralyzed a friend inside a waking nightmare. Bruce wordlessly pressed his lips to the arm in front of him, rested a cheek momentarily against J'onn's flesh in a woefully inadequate gesture of comfort.

"I have to stay with him," J'onn explained. "I can't leave him - not if there's going to be anything left of the man we know if we can find a way to stop this."

Batman nodded his understanding, his eyes drifting down to the rigid body on the medbay table. A warning hum sounded, enough that he could step away from J'onn, so they both could make their faces into expressions of impassive professionalism before the monitor viewscreen cleared.

"Batman? We found Lois," the Flash stated, "but she's at the Planet. You sure you want-?"

"Yes," Batman stated. "Access plan 21-kappa and follow the instructions. Tell Plasticman I will be there momentarily."

"Twenty-one-kappa," Wally repeated. "Got it." Batman saw his eyes widen slightly as he read the file, but Wally was a professional. He could handle it. He would have to. They all would have to. With a final glance at their fallen leader and a last comforting brush of J'onn's arm, Batman turned and headed out of the medbay toward the monitor womb.

end part 2

*********************

Mindstorm, part 3By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0"

^^^

"Bats reports he's stable," Plasticman's voice filtered through the comlink.

"Is he conscious?" Wonder Woman wanted to know. 

"Far as I know, no," Plasticman answered. "Whoops. Flash is here, gotta go. Call in when you get there."

The Watchtower signal faded out, and Green Lantern heard Diana mutter something under her breath. "You okay, Wonder Woman?" he asked.

"Keep an eye, Lantern. We're approaching the area where he went down."

"Roger that," Kyle replied, letting silence resume between them as the land below them grew more mountainous. Diana was upset, obviously. Hell, they all were. It wasn't exactly easy to take Superman down. But Diana's reaction had an undercurrent of doing what needed to be done but not liking it. It was familiar enough a feeling in the JLA, but at least Wally or Eel would vent.

Kyle's ring began to emit a sonar-like beep, indicating that they were zeroing in on the exact site where J'onn had found Superman. Kyle squinted down at old growth pine, not seeing any obvious signs of Superman's descent. 

"There's some sort of facility over there," Wonder Woman suddenly noted over the comlink, and Kyle glanced over to where she was gesturing, getting the ring to craft a spyglass for him when he couldn't pick out what she was talking about.

"There wasn't one on the map the computer pulled up," Kyle observed, finally seeing the small landing zone cut into the forest and from there able to spy a few Quonset huts tucked among the trees.

"I know," Wonder Woman acknowledged, and the intermittent beeping of Kyle's ring shifted to a steady tone.

Green Lantern stopped dead in the air and looked down. "This is the spot, I guess."

Wonder Woman hovered beside him, studying the ground below warily. "Nothing moving I can see, but -" She trailed off, and Lantern shuddered.

"Yeah, I know." The lack of obvious damage to the forest below was a chilling image to an airborne hero. It bespoke a fall from a stationary position rather than a crash from flight, and while the swath of damage was more dramatic and often more lethal from a crash landing than a straight dive, there were very very few scenarios that dropped a person straight down from flight. None of those scenarios were good.

Kyle followed Diana's lead as she dropped to the forest floor, and they landed beside a tangle of broken pine boughs and underbrush. The forest was silent.

Diana keyed her comlink. "Plasticman, Wonder Woman. We're at the site. Is there any radio traffic or movement from the base about two miles away?"

Instead of Plasticman, Batman's voice answered. "Wonder Woman, please give a more accurate fix on the base."

Diana glanced at Kyle. "Batman," he said, "I'm having the ring send up coordinates."

A half-second pause, then, "Received. I'm bringing satellite focus in on the region. Negative on radio communication, checking for other activity. Is there anything on site?"

"Crash looks to have been a trajectory of 90 degrees," Lantern reported. 

"Hm. J'onn characterizes whatever hit him as being like a psychic bomb. It is possible he stopped instantly when it hit."

"Like hitting a wall," Diana murmured, and a new tension seemed to gather in her body. "Batman, I am not certain it is relevant, but the forest is unnaturally quiet."

"I have no activity heading your direction on that base, but infrared picks up sentries. Odd. And you say quiet. Lantern, can you scan -?"

"Already on it," Kyle affirmed, his ring projecting a screen of information. "Doesn't look like there's any animal life forms within 300 yards of us, although as we've been talking that distance has been slowly decreasing."

"Purposeful decreasing?"

Kyle shook his head in answer to Diana's query. "More milling. Like everything scattered and is just coming back."

"Scattered 300 yards in all directions," Batman iterated. "A bigger distance than some species could have gotten in the minutes since Superman fell."

"Magic?" Green Lantern speculated.

Diana looked up from where she had knelt to examine the crash debris. "No. I would know if it were magic."

Kyle stared at the pile of broken tree limbs, then slowly pivoted to visually inspect the pristinely silent forest around the site. "I don't like this," he said uneasily.

"Agreed," Batman replied. "Both of you should get out of there."

"Batman?" Wonder Woman asked.

"J'onn said *like* a psychic bomb. That may be more accurate than we know. I've got Oracle trying to hack the facility you've pointed out, and if they've noticed you-"

"On our way out," Lantern acknowledged, rising up just to the level of the tree tops in order to take advantage of whatever cover they could provide as he got clear of Superman's crash site. He didn't need to glance back to know Wonder Woman was right behind him.

"See J'onn when you get back here," Batman ordered. "If there was any residue-"

"Understood," Diana cut him off, increasing speed and beginning an upward trajectory now that they were out of range of the base. "How is Superman?"

"Stable."

"We got that from Plasticman," Diana pointed out. "But J'onn hasn't jumped in with a telepathic link. What does stable mean?"

"Stable," Batman repeated. "We will discuss this when you get here."

The connection clicked off, and Kyle met Diana's eyes. "That doesn't sound good."

"No, it doesn't," she agreed, and both heroes increased their speed through the stratosphere.

End part 3

*******************

Mindstorm, part 4 By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0"

Lois Lane paused just outside her cubicle to blow across the top of her coffee and take a sip. Her eyes gazed across the press room floor and through the glass doors separating the press room from the reception area. There was a soldier standing there.

Soldiers weren't her worry in the moment, however, and she refocused her attention as she entered her cubicle and settled back at her computer. The puzzle pieces were coming together. There still was not quite enough solid evidence linking Luthor to the Masters killing, and given what had happened on the Imperiex story, Perry was not going to print anything that wasn't 100% ironclad. 

She was almost there. She checked her email and smiled as a familiar address appeared in her inbox. Maybe this would be-

"Ms. Lane?"

Lois rapidly minimized her email window and glanced up to find the soldier standing at the opening of her cubicle. "Yes?" Her mind began flashing through scenarios; had the government been tracking her activity? Was she too close to a truth that the powers that be did not want uncovered? The soldier's words caught her off guard.

"Ms. Lane, I'm sorry to have to tell you that your husband was involved in a serious accident-"

An incredulous laugh escaped Lois' mouth. "My husband? There must be some mistake. My husband-"

"Ms. Lane, you are married to Clark Kent?"

"Well, yes."

"Mr. Kent was in Wyoming early this morning and was involved in a serious traffic accident near a military facility-"

"Look, Mr. -" Lois glanced at the young man's ID badge- "Swift, I'm not sure what base you claimed to be from or how you pulled the wool over the receptionist's eyes, but when you're impersonating military personnel you should know enough when to take your lid off-" Her objection trailed off as her eyes finally got to the face of the soldier standing before her, and she felt her blood go suddenly cold. "Wally?" she whispered.

"Yes, ma'am. As I was saying, your husband was involved in a serious accident in Wyoming and was badly injured. My commander has asked that you be brought back to the base." 

Lois stood, her hands trembling. "I need to talk to Perry. Oh god. Just wait here, okay?"

Wally gave a nod and stationed himself at the entrance to Lois' cubicle as she moved numbly to Perry White's office. She knocked on the editor's door, barely waiting for Perry's grunt of acknowledgement to enter. "Oh, it's you, Lane. Got your sources square yet?"

"Perry-"

"Great Caesar's Ghost, Lois! You're white as a sheet! What's going on?"

She gestured back out toward the press room where Wally in his military disguise was clearly visible. "That soldier, he says Clark -"

"Lois, what happened?"

"He says Clark was in an accident in Wyoming. That he was badly hurt. I didn't even realize he was in Wyoming-"

Perry shot another look at the soldier. "Lois, shut the door," he ordered.

She obeyed, her knees almost collapsing when she finally lowered herself into the chair across the desk from Perry. 

"Lois, this is my fault."

"What-"

"I never thought - Dammit! He shouldn't be such a damned good reporter."

"Perry, what are you-"

"Look, Lois, I didn't really fire Clark."

"What are you talking about? I was right here, I heard it -"

"It was an act. Pre-arranged. We should have told you, but - hell, Clark, even *Superman* thought it was a bad idea to keep you out of the loop-"

Sudden anger helped Lois function through her shock. "Perry White, you tell me what you're talking about *right now* or I swear I'll-"

"He was still on the case, Lois. Still looking for evidence on Luthor. Don't you see? We *had* to make it look like he was discredited, to-"

"Still tracking Luthor."

"I know it wasn't right to keep it from you but we figured the less people knew, the less people were-" he paused - "in danger," he finished weakly.

"Well, this is just great!" Lois fumed, rising to her feet to pace angrily. "Now he's out in god knows where, hurt bad enough that the damned *military* is telling me to come out to sit at his bedside-" She stopped, standing in the middle of the floor and staring at Wally. He was standing still in her cubicle, and that was a bad sign. "Perry, I need to take some personal leave."

"Of course," Perry said briskly. "All you need. I'll reassign -"

"Don't touch the Luthor-Masters thing," she ordered, a knot twisting in her stomach. They had already been running articles on the suspicious death of Masters, and if Luthor knew - but no, Luthor didn't know that Clark was Superman. Did he?

"I won't," Perry promised. "Just - look, go. Be with him. Call me with any news."

"Okay. Okay." She crossed to his door in a daze. "Give Jimmy the Biyalan Embassy piece - they know him already."

"Right." Perry rose and followed her, holding the door for her as she headed back to her cubicle. Behind her, she heard him bellow, "OLSEN!"

Wally was standing just where she left him. "Let me just shut down my computer," she said. Then, more quietly, "How bad?"

Wally shook his head slightly. "I'm supposed to take you back to your apartment to pack a bag. I'll tell you there."

"Pack-" Lois echoed. "Shit. That bad?" She clicked through a half-dozen "save" and "are you sure?" windows.

"I'll tell you," Wally promised quietly as the computer powered down. Lois scooped up her purse and her jacket and led the way to the elevators.

Wally stayed silent, and Lois wondered if there was reason to fear their conversation would be bugged. Luthor was ruthless, and if this were a threat... but no, Luthor wouldn't be that subtle. He would want her to know what he was doing.

They reached the main lobby, and Wally leaned close to her. "Is there a back door?"

She nodded, turning left instead of right and leading him back toward the alley exit. He glanced around as they exited, then startled her by wrapping his arms around her. "Hold tight," he ordered.

She had been a superhero's wife for too long to question; she grabbed hold and squeezed her eyes closed, protecting her eyes from fine debris in the air and saving herself the vertigo-like effect of watching the world blur by.

It was only a few seconds later that Wally stopped. "Hope you've got your keys."

She lifted her face from where it had been pressed against his chest, and he set her down. She rubbed at one mildly windburned ear and dug in her purse. "So glad I styled my hair today," she remarked, brandishing her keys and opening the door.

She waited until Wally entered behind her and shut the door before she whirled on him. "Okay, West. Spill!"

"Hold on," he stalled, reaching into pocket to pull out some small electronic device. He glanced around the room, then strode over to an available outlet and plugged it in. "Sorry," he apologized, "Batman's orders."

"Scrambler?"

Wally nodded. "We don't know what hit him, Lois. J'onn said it was like a psychic bomb went off in his head. Like someone wanted him to go absolutely nuts and start killing people and destroying things."

"Psychic bomb? Is he - is-?" She wasn't sure how to ask what she wanted to know.

"J'onn said he was able to stabilize him, but I gotta be honest, he looks really bad. He's just lying there, like a coma or something."

Lois closed her eyes and brought her hand to her mouth for a minute.

"Lois?"

She opened her eyes, realizing Wally had changed into his Flash gear and wondering when he had done that, caught by a sense that everything was unreal. She took a steadying breath. "J'onn says he's stable?"

"Yeah. He's the one who said you should be there, so I figure he's gotta have a plan."

"Right," Lois agreed, fighting off paralyzing panic with a sense that she was *needed* - there was something she had to do. "Just give me a couple minutes to pack."

Wally nodded again, and she headed into the bedroom, grabbing a couple changes of clothes and her toiletry kit. She crammed it all into an overnight bag and went back to the living room.

Wally was talking into his comlink, but he stopped when he saw her. "Ready?"

She nodded.

"Then hold on again," he directed. "We're 'porting up."

End part 4

********************

Mindstorm, part 5By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0" (note much of scene comes directly from JLA #74)

...not real it's not real it's not real it's not real it's not real it's...

*Shut UP!* Superman mentally screamed at himself as he joined Plasticman in holding Lantern back. 

"Run..." Wally's voice, so weak. "Please... just run."

Superman waited a split second for Kyle to compose himself enough to allow him to let go. Then he asked for translation and stood forward as leader to face the warrior whose massive hand wrapped around Wally's torso and neck. "Give him to me," Superman demanded, trying not to let the blood trickling from the stumps of Wally's legs distract him. "For god's sake," he breathed. "There's still time. Let me help him."

He could barely process the message of Rama Khan, telling him they were destroyers. A misunderstanding. It was a massive misunderstanding.

"You have been misled," he tried to explain, rage storming through him, up into his eyes. "Please... let me help my friend... and let's talk."

...real it's not real it's not real it's not real it's not...

With a roar, the giant warrior threw Flash's body down and stormed at Superman, and with an enraged scream, Superman unleashed his heat vision into warrior's face. Around him the others jumped into the fray, picking their enemies, ready to fight to the death. Over the clash of weapons and bodies, Superman thought he heard Wally call to J'onn, and then a raging bonfire erupted below.

...it's not real it's not real it's not real it's not real it's not....

Superman spared a glance to see J'onn's body writhing in the flames, Wally's broken effort to reach for him, and then the big warrior was slamming into him again, carrying him far from the battlefield over Atlantis.

...brought Atlantis back this isn't real isn't real isn't real...

He tried to reason with his adversary, explain how the corrupt Atlantean government was keeping slaves, about Arthur, trapped in that pool, tortured - but the warrior recited his belief that Superman was the destroyer of the world and came at him again, carrying their battle across China and Siberia, throwing punches that sent Superman's body over the pole and into the new world.

...not real no fight safe isn't real...

*LIKE HELL IT'S NOT!* Superman railed, mustering his waning strength for another hit from the warrior. There must be magic involved somewhere, because he could feel his ribs snapping, and he was certain there was blood spreading inside his guts, kept in his body only by his skin. He blinked the sweat out of his eyes and slammed his fists into the warrior's head, repeated blows that resounded almost as loud as the sonic booms of their travel over water, into the stratosphere, and then down down down down...

...not real don't believe it don't believe...

Superman felt his body hit, his shoulders dislocate and spine shatter. The force of his collision with the ground compressed his chest, squeezed rib fragments through heart and lungs and spleen and stomach. He couldn't breathe, couldn't...

...not real not real not real not real...

He left his body, could see it below him, watched as a final heave drove a mammoth stone dagger through his chest. He saw himself spasm once and lie still, not far from where... oh god...

...not real not real not real...

Wally, lifeless. J'onn's corpse, desiccated by flame. Batman and Wonder Woman, their hands reached out toward one another as if... no that wasn't right. They were comrades in arms, not lovers. His mind was going now, joining his body in death. Things weren't making sense, like Lantern, standing there and letting - 

*KYLE!* Superman's soul screamed, but who could hear a spirit crying over the sound of a beating heart being ripped from an unresisting chest? Superman flung his spectral self at the man who killed his friend, wanting to batter him lifeless, but he felt a pulling, a drawing away...

...not real safe you're safe not...

And all was darkness.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^

"J'onn. J'onn!" Wally called softly, staying a careful distance away from the Martian.

J'onn was barely managing some semblance of humanoid form. One arm reached out to rest a hand against Superman's sweat-drenched forehead. The other arm was melded into his torso and what should have been legs, folded together and hovering three feet off the ground. The blue cape curled around his misshapen body, collar rising almost protectively around J'onn's neck. The expression on J'onn's face was strained, his eyes closed and his jaw tight as if he were gritting his teeth. His entire form was trembling.

"J'onn!" Wally called again.

This time the eyelids fluttered for a moment, and Wally waited as the rigidity seemed to ease from J'onn's body. The tight knot of his melded limbs loosened, and he brought a shaking hand to his face for a moment before he raised his eyes. "Wallace," he greeted.

"You okay there, green guy?" Wally asked. He glanced at Superman, noting with a shudder that there were tears rolling down the sides of his face. "Is he okay?"

"We will live," J'onn answered, gently brushing away the tears at Superman's temples with the backs of his fingers before withdrawing his hand from the Man of Steel's face.

"Okay," Wally acknowledged uncomfortably. "I've got Lois waiting outside but I just wanted -"

J'onn turned his somber face to regard Wally fully. "I understand, Wallace. It is good that she is here. Please have her come in."

Wally averted his eyes from J'onn's meaningful gaze, once more looking to Superman's face. "Should I warn her of anything or-"

"I will talk to her, Wallace."

Wally sucked in a deep breath. "Okay. Okay." He turned toward the door but was arrested by J'onn's voice.

"He is glad you are well and whole, Wally. And he is glad for Lois. We won't lose."

Somehow, J'onn's words only made everything seem worse.

End part 5

************************

Mindstorm, part 6By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0" 

/We won't lose./ The words felt more like bravado than a promise as J'onn carefully composed himself. He let his body settle down into the chair he had ignored, schooling his body into the normal dimensions of his Martian Manhunter form. He maintained the carefully serious yet reassuring expression he had deemed appropriate to the situation, looking up with a half smile as Lois Lane entered the medbay.

She followed Wally with an odd mix of impatience and hesitancy, and J'onn could feel her deep alarm under the veneer of confident concern she wore. "Hello, Lois," J'onn greeted. "Please-" he gestured her to the exam table.

The invitation seemed to be all Lois had been waiting for. She stepped around Wally and strode briskly to her husband's side, resting her hand on one of his and gazing at his face. "I'm here, Clark," she said.

J'onn nodded, closing his eyes to focus on the weak signal of awareness deep in Superman's consciousness. "He can feel you," he reported, a sense of relief flooding through him. He had been uncertain if any of the real activity around Superman had penetrated past the nightmare visions that consumed the Kryptonian's consciousness. He could feel Kal's desperate hold on the mental tether J'onn was maintaining for him, and until this moment he had wondered if Kal was reading events from J'onn's consciousness. Now, however, he could feel Lois' touch through Kal's unresponsive fingers.

"What happened?" Lois demanded. "What's wrong with him?"

J'onn shook his head slightly, reaching out once more to rest his hand against Superman's temple. "I don't know exactly what happened. He called to me as he felt an... attack... on his mind, but what he is experiencing is inconsistent with telepathically induced delusion."

Lois wrapped her fingers around the hand she held and stroked her husband's forehead. "You'll have to try that in smaller words," she said. "Why is he so still?"

"Paralysis," J'onn offered, and Lois looked up sharply. "I did that to him," J'onn explained reluctantly.

Lois continued to stare at him. "Why?"

J'onn sighed. "Lois, whoever - whatever did this - however they are doing it..." He broke off, searching for words. "Inside Clark's - Superman's - mind," he tried again, "his world is being completely shattered. He is watching his friends tortured and murdered, everything he believes in ripped to shreds. It is as if there is a constant goad for him to lash out, to protect us, you, the world. It feels very real to him."

Lois' eyes drifted back to her husband's face. "He's feeling that right now?"

"Yes," J'onn confirmed. "The intensity has diminished a little in the past several minutes, but yes."

Lois considered for a moment, and Wally, still standing to one side, spoke up. "J'onn, Lois, do you guys need-"

"We are fine for the moment, Wallace," J'onn reassured, freeing the younger hero to escape the disturbing sight of Superman's unmoving form.

"Okay," Wally replied, dashing from the med bay and leaving J'onn and Lois alone.

Lois finally chose to sit on the chair beside the bed. "This delusion," she began, "it's strong enough that he believes he's really living it?"

"Yes."

"And that is why you paralyzed him."

"Yes."

J'onn could feel Lois processing the information, rationalizing away anger at J'onn as she imagined how Clark would respond to threats to everything he loved. "But you said he can feel me."

"Yes. I had hoped he might. When his mind was attacked, he was able to stave off the effect for a few seconds - long enough that I was able to protect a small part of his consciousness. The Superman we know is there, under the ravages of the delusion, although I suspect that was not the intent of whoever launched this attack."

Lois took a deep breath and rested both her hands on Clark's still fingers. She blew out the air she had taken in and once more raised her eyes to J'onn. "Okay. Once more. From the top."

J'onn nodded. "Somewhere over Wyoming, someone or something attacked Superman's mind. The type of symptoms he is experiencing are usually the result of a telepath operating remotely on someone's mind, but if that were the case, I would be able to feel their presence and possibly back track them through their remote link. Whoever did this has created a situation where Superman's mind appears to have turned in on itself, and if I did not know so certainly that it was instigated, I would be inclined to believe it was a totally organic mental break down."

"Clark is the stablest person I know," Lois defended automatically. "He isn't-"

"I know," J'onn interrupted gently. "I just don't know how to fix it."

A warning beep sounded, and Lois looked around in confusion as J'onn said, "Go ahead, monitor."

A projected monitor screen flared to life a few feet from them, revealing Batman's face. "Lois," he greeted. "I have been screening traffic on Clark's and your cell phone accounts."

Lois opened her mouth as if to protest, but Batman continued talking. "There have been numerous calls from Clark's parents. I have managed to create a satellite link so that you will be able to get service if you would like to return their calls."

Lois closed her mouth and reached for the purse she had let fall to the floor beside her chair. "Clark's parents." She stopped, looking at her husband's face. "God, what am I going to tell them?"

J'onn reached out to gently rest a hand on her shoulder, drawing her startled attention. "He has been attacked and hurt, but he is stable," he suggested.

He watched sympathetically as Lois' eyes once more went to Superman's frozen features. Then she shook herself, rummaging in her purse and retrieving her cell phone. It beeped under her fingertips. "Eight messages," she noted with alarm. "Batman, this will connect down to the planet?"

"It will," he promised, and with a half-apologetic look to J'onn, Lois began punching numbers into her phone.

While Lois was distracted, J'onn met Batman's eyes on the monitor. He allowed himself the luxury of reaching out to touch Bruce's mind, of drawing a brief moment's comfort from his lover.

It was a mistake. As soon as his telepathic attention was divided, J'onn felt Superman's delusions flaring up, threatening to engulf him. He abruptly cut contact with Bruce, focusing himself back on the link he had forged to Kal, emptying his mind of all thought save the most crucial one: *this isn¹t real.*

This time, at least, the horror was relatively contained. For Lois' sake, J'onn was able to maintain form and his distraction did not make an impression on her as she talked on her phone. Snatches of conversation caught passingly in J'onn's mind, and he forced himself to let them go, to keep his meditative focus.

"... he okay? What time?... I - no... Martha, I'm so... not injured, but... stable... did the doctors say... yes. I will... okay... bye."

J'onn watched with unfocused eyes as Lois lowered her cellphone and snapped it closed. It felt like half a lifetime that she sat holding it in her hand, staring at it as if it had offered her some betrayal. Her need for human contact pressed against J'onn's mind, but he shut it out. Batman's voice sounded over the monitor, clearly addressing Lois, but it was as if he was talking from a great distance, and Lois' response seemed muffled to J'onn's ears. He could feel them discussing him as well as Superman and something about Jonathan Kent? J'onn made his expression mild and reassuring, but he could not hear nor answer their questions. 

Batman finally must have signed off, because silence returned to the medbay. J'onn felt an easing of Superman's mind and slowly began backing out again. As sound and accurate vision returned, he realized that Lois was quietly crying.

End part 6

*********************

Mindstorm, part 7By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0" Note that the scene involving Kobra includes verbatim quotes and description from JSA #45.

Batman watched the teleport monitor signal Wally's successful arrival on the planet's surface. He could still feel the exhausted worry of J'onn's mind, an echo of the telepathic link that the Martian did not have the energy to maintain. The others would understand the seriousness of Superman's condition from the fact J'onn had asked for Lois to be brought up, but they could not know how fragile his "stable" condition really was, how possible it was that "stable" could become "dangerous." Batman was not going to be the one to tell them. At least, not until he had a chance to stash some kryptonite in the Watchtower.

As he turned to the monitor showing Superman's interrupted flight path, the comlink crackled to life. "Plasticman, Wonder Woman. We're at the site. Is there any radio traffic or movement from the base about two miles away?"

Plasticman started to open his mouth to reply, then stopped at a gesture from Batman. The Dark Knight frowned, his eyes scanning concentric circles around Superman's crash zone and seeing only terrain markings on their map. "Wonder Woman, please give a more accurate fix on the base."

This time Kyle answered. "Batman, I'm having the ring send up coordinates."

Batman's fingers tapped across the keyboard, downloading Kyle's projected data. "Received. I'm bringing satellite focus in on the region. Negative on radio communication, checking for other activity. Is there anything on site?"

"Hey, Batman, anything you need me-" Plasticman cut in from the other monitor station.

"Watch everything else," Batman ordered, turning his attention back to the reports from Lantern and Wonder Woman. He ignored Eel's muttering as Kyle began speaking again.

"Crash looks to have been a trajectory of 90 degrees." 

Batman scowled at the satellite image he was receiving at the coordinates Kyle had indicated. He sent a quick command to Oracle to piggyback their imaging capabilities to a DOD satellite, at the same time switching over to infrared scanning on his current feed. Another corner of his mind focused on the new information Kyle was giving him. "Hm. J'onn characterizes whatever hit him as being like a psychic bomb. It is possible he stopped instantly when it hit."

"Like hitting a wall," Diana's voice murmured over the comlink. Then, more decisively, she said, "Batman, I am not certain it is relevant, but the forest is unnaturally quiet."

An instant message from Oracle reported that the DOD imaging was not providing a cleaner feed in the visible light spectrum. Did he want her to try a hack? He sent her a quick affirmative, and returned his attention to the team on the ground. "I have no activity heading your direction on that base, but infrared picks up sentries. Odd. And you say quiet. Lantern, can you scan -?"

"Already on it," Kyle answered. "Doesn't look like there's any animal life forms within 300 yards of us, although as we've been talking that distance has been slowly decreasing."

A shiver of potential danger triggered down Batman's spine as Diana asked, "Purposeful decreasing?"

Kyle's answer calmed the sudden worry. "More milling. Like everything scattered and is just coming back."

"Scattered 300 yards in all directions," Batman considered. "A bigger distance than some species could have gotten in the minutes since Superman fell." Unless the impact of the fall...

"Magic?" Green Lantern speculated.

Diana's response was quick and certain. "No. I would know if it were magic." But J'onn had said it wasn't telepathy, at least not active telepathy. Beneath the cowl, Bruce Wayne's forehead creased in concentration.

The momentary puzzlement was set aside, though, as Lantern's voice came through in suddenly uneasy tones. "I don't like this."

"Agreed," Batman concurred, trusting Kyle's instinct for danger. "Both of you should get out of there."

"Batman?" Wonder Woman asked.

"J'onn said *like* a psychic bomb. That may be more accurate than we know. I've got Oracle trying to hack the facility you've pointed out, and if they've noticed you-"

"On our way out," Lantern acknowledged, and Batman watched as both Kyle's and Diana's signals showed them to be moving away from the crash site.

"See J'onn when you get back here," Batman ordered. "If there was any residue-"

"Understood," Diana interrupted. He was unsurprised at her next query. "How is Superman?"

Batman felt the unwelcome flavor of J'onn's weariness and worry return to memory and quashed it firmly. "Stable."

"We got that from Plasticman, but J'onn hasn't jumped in with a telepathic link." Diana's tone was getting almost hostile. "What does stable mean?"

"Stable. We will discuss this when you get here." He snapped closed the comlink decisively, his eyes turning to Oracle's report on the military facility Wonder Woman and Green Lantern had noticed. It was too close to Superman's crash site to explain away why the base wasn't investigating; they had to have noticed. They had the requisite radar facilities and... an angry frown turned down the corners of Batman's mouth. They had DEO clearance for meta research. His fingers reached to the keys, sending rapid fire orders to Oracle to find out the exact clearance codes and any details of research they might be doing.

Almost as quickly as he typed, a red flagged note came up from Oracle. His eyes widened a little at the name she had plucked from the base's record history. Masters. Damn.

He did not have time to process the development before the teleport signal alerted him to the arrivals of the Flash and Lois Lane. The comlink flared to life again, this time with Wally announcing unnecessarily, "We're here."

Batman did not remark on the obviousness of the point, instead making a quick check of what was happening in the medbay. He almost cursed aloud when he saw the way J'onn was curled in on himself, linked in a trembling circuit with the still unmoving Superman. "Wally, have Lois wait outside when you get to the medbay," he ordered.

"Will do," Wally answered briefly, his tone hiding any worry at this demand, undoubtedly for Lois' benefit. Batman glanced back at the troubling images from the medbay-

"That doesn't look good," Plasticman's voice suddenly chirped from near his elbow.

Batman turned with a snarl.

Plas pulled back a little, his head adopting the shape of a cartoon rabbit in a "don't hit me" pose. "It doesn't. You want me to spell you so you-?"

"Watch the monitor, Plasticman," Batman snapped, turning his back on the other hero and fighting off the urge to answer him with a yes. His eyes went back to the red flag document from Oracle. Masters. Lois was working on the Masters assassination. Coincidence?

He reached out to the keyboard. "Check cell phone records on Kent, C and Lane, L," he typed.

An acknowledgment came through almost instantly, and Batman felt his eyes drift back to the monitor showing the medbay. Wally was there now, and as he watched, J'onn seemed to come back into himself. A weak smile on the Martian features did much to reassure Batman, and he turned back to the information continuing to come in from Oracle.

"Batman, Kyle and Diana are back," Plasticman interrupted, his words followed in seconds by a comlink ping.

"Go ahead, Diana," Batman identified.

"We're back," she said brusquely. "Is J'onn still in the medbay?"

"Affirmative, but he may not be available. Are you or Lantern feeling any ill effects?"

"I'm fine," Kyle answered. "Diana?"

There was a minute pause that suggested the reigning in of temper, then Diana said, "What's going on, Batman? Has Superman's condition worsened?"

Batman glanced at the monitor. Lois was settling down at Superman's bedside. "It does not appear to have. Lois Lane has just arrived," he explained.

"Oh." Did he imagine it, or was there a sense of mollified surprise in Diana's tone? "So what next?" she asked.

"Hold-" Batman began, only to have Plasticman interrupt him. 

"Batman, we've got problems planetside."

"Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, please stand by," Batman directed, turning his attention to the monitor Plasticman was watching.

"Kobra," Plasticman explained, identifying the source of the superhero scramble outside the US District Court in New York City. "Powergirl just pulled a bomb out of the crowd, let it explode above the skyline."

"And the bomb was from Kobra's people?"

"Not clear," Plasticman admitted, leaning in to the keyboard and hitting a few keys. "I tried to activate our spy cams inside, but -" He gestured toward a blank blue screen on one monitor.

"Hh," Batman responded, stepping forward and displacing Plasticman at the keyboard. "If the JSA is on scene - there we go."

Plasticman blinked as the blue screen fuzzed and suddenly showed King Kobra in the witness box, no fewer than five guns leveled at his head. "How - wait, why's he just sitting there?"

Another key tap brought sound into the monitor womb, and in his ear, Kyle's voice asked, "You need us somewhere, Batman?"

"I'm not sure yet. Wait."

From the monitor speaker, Mr. Terrific's voice sounded tinnily: "...being played."

Kobra's answer was clearer. "Very astute of you, Mr. Terrific. And now that I have the world's attention, allow me to explain--" Above the small monitor, television feeds from various media outlets suddenly flared to life to deliver Kobra's message - that five hundred people outside the courthouse had been implanted with incendiary devices and would self-immolate if Kobra were not instantly released.

"Oh, man," Plasticman breathed. "Why the hell do the bad guys get to play by different rules?" Batman held up a silencing hand as he listened to Director Bones, but the words from the DEO chief's mouth only got Plasticman started. "He's not just going to let him go? What the - how many times -"

"Plasticman!" Batman snapped, turning away in disgust as Kobra teleported off the courthouse steps. "Diana, Kyle, there's nothing we can do about it at this moment, but you should know that Kobra has successfully engineered an escape from his trial."

"He WHAT?" Kyle demanded. "How -"

"I suggest," Batman overrode, "that both you and Wonder Woman report to your own quarters where you can follow the news. I will contact you when J'onn is able to scan you. Stay on alert."

"Any updates on Superman?" Wonder Woman wanted to know. 

"Still stable," Batman repeated for what felt like the twentieth time. A beeping sound came from his previous work station, and he crossed back to it. "Batman out." He glanced down to see a flashing message from Oracle. He gritted his teeth to hold back a curse and reclaimed his seat. He glanced regretfully at the medbay monitor before tapping the code that would signal J'onn.

There was barely a pause before J'onn's voice came through with its usual soothing baritone. "Go ahead, monitor."

Batman kept his expression neutral as he offered a greeting nod toward Lois. "Lois. I have been screening traffic on Clark's and your cell phone accounts." She looked about to protest, but he continued, "There have been numerous calls from Clark's parents. I have managed to create a satellite link so that you will be able to get service if you would like to return their calls."

Lois closed her mouth and reached for something on the floor, her words muffled as she spoke to J'onn.

The Martian's words came back clearly: "He has been attacked and hurt, but he is stable."

Lois seemed to take a moment to gather herself before she opened her phone. "Eight messages! Batman, this will connect down to the planet?"

"It will," he promised, turning his attention to J'onn as she quickly began punching in numbers.

As he met J'onn's eyes, he felt the sudden sense of *connection* that signaled the opening of a telepathic link. *J'onn,* he welcomed warmly, forcing back any consciousness of Kobra's escape and the possible military involvement in Superman's condition in order to offer comfort to the weary touch that answered him.

If Batman were not so well versed in the limits of Martian reserves, the strain evident in J'onn's mind would have alarmed him. Instead, he was able to lend strength to his lover, letting him tap into Bruce's energy. He offered a mental caress, hoping to soothe, and suddenly J'onn was recoiling.

*Can't - have -*

*Go,* Bruce allowed, recognizing a pressure against J'onn's mind that must be originating with Superman. On the monitor, he could see J'onn's eyes grow glassy and a fixedly mild expression overtake his features. He was trying to be reassuring, Batman recognized, wishing there were something he could do.

He gave himself a mental shake. There was something he could do. He could solve this mystery, find out what had been done to Superman so it could be *undone.* 

Masters had somehow been connected to the base in Wyoming. Coincidental red herring? The man had been high in a shadow government that may or may not have been in Luthor's control. He had his fingers all over the place, as they had discovered during the Du Bois case.

He glanced back at the medbay monitor and frowned at the expression on Lois' face. He bumped up the sound to hear what she was saying. "... doctors say what caused it?"

That didn't sound like they were discussing Superman. 

"... there with you now? ... Oh, Martha... Yes... I just wish - ... I will... You should too, you know. ... Okay... Take care of him for us. As soon as things get better here... yeah. Give him our love. Bye."

Batman watched quietly as Lois closed her phone and regarded it for a long time, her teeth peering out to worry her lower lip in a very unLois-like fashion. He gave her a moment, but he spoke to her before she shook herself out of it enough to notice the attitude of J'onn's face and body. "Lois, is there anything you need?"

Her head snapped up, and the eyes that met his showed more fear than he was used to from her. "I need everyone to be okay," she pointed out with a hint of her trademark sarcasm. "Don't suppose your billions could buy me that, eh, Bruce?"

He didn't wince; he knew where her reaction was coming from. "Not directly," he answered honestly. "Did something happen to the Kents?"

"Beyond me having to tell them about this? It was so news they didn't need. Martha was calling from the hospital. Jonathan collapsed into seizures this morning."

"This morning," Batman repeated.

"That's what I just said. At least Mrs. Ross is around to-"

Batman ignored her comments in favor of typing directions to Oracle. "Lois," he interrupted, "this is important. What time this morning?"

Lois blinked. "More or less just now. Twenty minutes, half an hour ago. Why - " Her eyes widened and she turned her gaze back to her husband. "You don't think-"

"I don't know what to think," Batman replied grimly. "However, some coincidences are too coincidental. Do you-"

But he could see Lois was not paying attention to him. Instead she was staring at Superman - and, Batman realized belatedly, at-

"J'onn?" her voice queried.

Batman forced his tone into a gentler register. "He's okay," he stated.

"How do you know?"

He let his voice settle even further into Bruce Wayne's registers. "Because I do."

That brought Lois' attention back to the monitor. "And my husband?" There was a tearful edge in her voice.

"J'onn says he's stable," Bruce reassured. "It is requiring a lot of work from J'onn to keep him stable, but he would not lie."

Lois blinked quickly a couple times and reached her hand back to wrap around Superman's unresponding fingers.

Batman cleared his throat. "I'm going to let you go," he said, "but I want to send Aquaman down to talk to Clark's parents. Martha likes him, and he may learn something that will help-"

He stopped speaking at Lois' distracted nod, and realizing she was doing her best not to cry in front of him, he quietly disconnected his line to the medbay. He kept a monitoring view open, but he had work to do, and he had to trust J'onn to care for Lois and her husband.

End part 7

****************

Mindstorm, part 8By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0"

There were, in the deepest ocean, dangers and hazards that surface dwellers would never know. Perhaps worst among them were tangle vines, carnivorous beds of kelp that wrapped themselves around the unsuspecting swimmer and slowly wound tighter, eventually cutting into flesh and spilling life-giving blood to the hungry plant. As king, Arthur had demanded regular missions to uproot the weed wherever it had taken hold within a five mile radius of Poseidonis, but there were still occasions when someone would get snared.

It was a risky business to rescue someone from tangle vines, and not always successful. To try to free someone by one's self was total folly, but even having a second person well clear of the waving tendrils did not guarantee the would-be rescuer would not become a second victim. 

Arthur's first thought when J'onn's desperate mental touch had reached him from Superman's side had been, "It's like tangle vines!"

Now, after half an hour submerged and resting in his quarters, Arthur could not shake the comparison. He could still feel the tightening of J'onn's mental link, anchoring against his mind with none of the Martian's usual gentleness. The aftermath of the contact still throbbed in Arthur's temples. And through that link - the image bleedthrough from Superman's consciousness had been more than unnerving. For a panicked moment, Arthur had thought he was going to get sucked down with him, lost in end of the world horror, watching friends and loved ones and innocent bystanders tortured and killed. Then he had felt J'onn's solid mental frame, realized how he was being shielded. He had set himself as an anchor and watched in fascination as the more adept telepath did things on the mental plane that had stabilized the maelstrom that was raging in Superman's mind.

It had still seemed like a battle with tangle vines until J'onn had thrust him roughly clear and he had found himself sitting in a chair with a pitcher of water turned over his head.

So Arthur paused for a moment outside the medbay door before he entered. He made an effort to calm and order his thoughts, steeling himself to help J'onn again. Batman's instructions had been vague; J'onn was going to scan Diana and Kyle and did not dare risk too much distraction from the task of managing Superman's mind. Arthur hoped against hope that J'onn did not intend to borrow Arthur's mental energy as a place holder while he checked over the other heroes. One descent into that maelstrom had been enough, and he wasn't sure another would leave him fit for the second half of Batman's assignment.

Arthur squared his shoulders finally and opened the medbay door. He had barely entered when J'onn was speaking to him. "Orin. How are you feeling?"

Arthur nodded toward J'onn, feeling the tight buzz of his active telepathy filling the room. He ignored Wonder Woman's concerned glance, although he knew why she was not the one asking the question. "I am recovered. Good morning, Ms. Lane."

"It's Lois, Arthur." At Superman's bedside, Lois Lane gave him a tight smile, and even at this distance, he could sense the clinging moisture of recent tears on her cheeks. "And good morning. Hell of a day, isn't it?"

"Yes," he agreed, accepting her cue that she needed Clark's friends on hand, not Superman's colleagues. "Has there been any further word on Jonathan?"

She shook her head. "I heard you helped earlier with Clark. Thank you."

Arthur let himself glance at the rigidly still figure of Superman. "He would do the same for me," he replied, resisting the urge to squirm under Lois' gratitude.

At the table, Kyle cleared his throat. "Um, shouldn't we get this done? I don't want to just sit around with the Kobra thing and-"

J'onn frowned. "Kobra thing?"

"The JSA is handling it," Batman's voice came icily from a monitor that had suddenly flared to life, and Arthur let himself be relieved that he was not the target of that particular tone. It wasn't that he was intimidated by Batman, but the man could be unbearably obstructionist when he got into a brooding spell. Not that Arthur was any more clued in than J'onn, but apparently there had been a reason a general alert had not been sounded.

"Very well," J'onn decided, "Arthur, if I may use you as an anchor?"

Arthur nodded. "You need me right there or -"

"Actually, if you can sit at the table with Kyle and Diana-"

"Of course."

"Lois, I need you to just continue to hold Clark's hand." J'onn's voice was quiet, but in the relative silence of the medbay it carried. The Martian offered a gentle squeeze to Lois' shoulder before closing his eyes and settling down on the opposite side of the bed.

In contrast to their earlier contact, J'onn's mental touch to Arthur's mind was almost soothing. At least it was until J'onn's voice traveled along their link. *Orin, I must ask you to do these scans.*

Carefully keeping his face neutral, Arthur offered J'onn a mental gape. *J'onn, I can't-*

*You can. I have augmented your telepathy, but I can only provide power. I cannot afford the distraction of focused work.*

*I wouldn't know what to- oh!* A sudden rush of flavor seemed to roll through Arthur's mind, recognizable as a mental signature. He explored it for a moment, testing its undertones and bouquet. *That's - distinct,* he remarked.

*Yes,* J'onn agreed. *It seems familiar, but I cannot place it.*

*Can't place _this_?* Arthur said incredulously. *I would think sensing it once-*

*Orin, I sense many things,* J'onn reminded. *This is what I have extracted as inconsistent with Superman's mental matrix. If the others-*

*Right,* Arthur cut in, feeling a hint of the earlier tangled sensation once again bleeding through from J'onn. *I'll try.*

Arthur took a moment to compose his mind, and he heard J'onn telling the others he was about to scan them. He wondered why J'onn didn't just explain - but no, one explanation would require others, and it would be too much to make clear what was really happening there in the world that was claiming Superman's mind. No, simpler just to do as J'onn was asking, reach out with his own telepathy...

He almost gasped as he felt how far his mind's reach extended, how effortlessly he was able to skim across the surfaces of Diana's and Kyle's minds. Thoughts bounced into his consciousness as easily as if they were his own, and he forced himself to ignore them, focusing instead on the mental signature J'onn had forwarded to him.

It was detail work, quickly done but requiring concentration. That was particularly true given the way J'onn's power boost was making his telepathy "hear" far more than he was ever privy to. Within a few minutes he was able to establish that whatever else was true, what had touched Superman's mind had been no where near either Lantern nor Wonder Woman. *They're clear,* he reported to J'onn. *Pull me out.*

With the same gentle efficiency that he had used to set their link, J'onn withdrew the extra energy he was supplying to Arthur's telepathy. A involuntary shudder went through Arthur's body as the distinctness of others' thoughts returned to the usual vague awareness of their emotional states, easily tuned out and ignored.

"Are you okay, Arthur?" Wonder Woman asked.

Of course she would notice, he thought to himself, giving her a curt nod. "Fine."

"As are both of you," J'onn added, earning a puzzled glance from Kyle. If the younger man had intended to explain his expression, however, the moment was lost when Batman's voice once more came through the monitor.

"Good. If you three can report to the monitor womb-"

"Me and Kyle and-"

"Arthur," Batman clarified. "Unless J'onn-"

"We're okay, Batman," J'onn replied, giving Lois a quick smile. "Perhaps some coffee could be brought up later, but -"

"Understood. Batman out."

Diana and Kyle looked at each other. "Guess we've been summoned," Kyle remarked, rising to his feet and giving J'onn another odd glance. "You sure you're okay, big guy?"

"I am well, Kyle."

The Green Lantern shrugged and headed toward the door, pausing to say, "It's good to see you, Ms. Lane. He's in good hands."

"I know," she answered, returning Wonder Woman's nod and watching the other woman follow Kyle.

Arthur rose finally and paused beside Superman's feet. This close, the tangling sensation rose up again, and he felt the hair prickle on the back of his neck. He kept the reaction off his face, however, asking, "Lois, is there any special message for the Kents?"

"Just that we love them," she said, her fingers tightening to white knuckled on Superman's hand. 

"Very well," Arthur acknowledged. "J'onn."

"Orin."

Arthur turned then and met the others outside the medbay door, walking with them in tense silence through the Watchtower corridors. That silence lasted until they entered the monitor womb.

"What in Hades-!" Diana burst out, flying halfway up the central tower as around Batman, monitors flickered with countless scenes of destruction.

"Mordru," Batman's voice answered, and Arthur realized he was down at the lowest level of the monitor womb, typing furiously and apparently listening to something.

"Eel sucker!" Arthur spat, remembering the sorcerer's effort to force Poseidonis to remain in the dimensional bubble that Garth had fashioned for them during the Imperiex disaster. It had been as close as the Atlantean monarch had ever been to giving up all hope for himself and his people.

"What happened?" Kyle demanded. "I thought Fate-"

Batman still hadn't turned from his station. "He appears to have taken over Fate, and recruited Eclipso and Obsidian. New York City is completely under cover of darkness, and Kobra seems to be taking advantage of the escalating chaos. The JSA is swamped." Finally the Dark Knight spun in his chair. "Diana, Kyle, there have been terrorist bombings in Calcutta and Los Angeles that could use superhero attention. If you finish there they could use back up in DC and Paris. Go."

If either were inclined to argue or question, they did not show it in their response as they both flew from the monitor womb, the wind of their wakes pulling at Arthur's hair and beard. "And me?"

"The Kents," Batman replied.

"Even with-"

"Especially with all this. He's our biggest weapon, him and J'onn, and right now we don't have either of them. And we can't afford to have him become a weapon against us."

Arthur swallowed a reaction to Batman's final sentence, asking instead, "You think what happened to Jonathan-"

"It happened at almost the same instant."

Arthur's eyes met the lenses of Batman's cowl. After a beat, he turned on heel. "I'll call from Kansas." He headed toward the door, hearing Batman recall the Flash to the Watchtower as he left and wondering what chaos would meet him on the planet below.

End part 8

*****************

Mindstorm, part 9By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0" 

It was not the first time that the fastest man on Earth had been sent for coffee in the midst of a world crisis. In fact, it was something of a routine request as far as that went; the staff at selected Radu's had become accustomed to a sudden gust of wind followed by a depletion of caffeinated beverages and generous contribution to the cash drawer. 

Except this time, the Flash had not been sent to Radu's.

This time, the Flash was moving carefully through the medbay door bearing a silver tea tray.

"Coffee!" he announced as he entered, forcing more cheer than he felt into his tone. He set the tea tray down on a table near to the bed where Superman lay.

"You are a ministering angel," Lois Lane announced gratefully, rising from her chair. "J'onn?"

Wally joined Lois in looking expectantly at the Martian, but J'onn offered a slight smile and shook his head. "You go ahead."

Lois shrugged and crossed to the table. "What's with the fancy china?"

"Um-"

"She knows, Wallace," J'onn rumbled mildly, causing Lois to turn.

"Knows what?"

"Well, then, Alfred sent up some Chocos, too," Wally stated with a sense of relief, noting that Lois accepted the implied answer. "He told me to insist that you eat some."

"That's sweet," Lois remarked as she lifted a newly filled cup to her lips. "And this is *really* good coffee!" she added.

"Alfred has very high standards," J'onn observed. "And Wally, I will have some Chocos later. Am I to infer that there is about to be a changing of the guard on monitor?"

Wally blinked. "Batman said-"

J'onn waved away Wally's words. "He is not the only detective here. I suspect-"

"J'onn. Flash. Lois." The monitor screen suddenly flared to life, revealing Batman's stoic features. "I think you need to hear Aquaman's report. Go ahead, Arthur."

"J'onn, I was just in to see Jonathan Kent. He's doing pretty well, by the way, Lois. But J'onn, the energy around him - it's much diminished, but -"

"It's the same?"

"Exactly. Absolutely exactly the same."

"Same as what?" Lois demanded.

"J'onn, you can explain better than I can-" 

"Earlier today," J'onn began, directing his words toward Lois but speaking to all of them, "I was able to isolate the mental energies winding through Superman's mind which are not a part of his normal psychical matrix. I shared those with Arthur when we scanned Kyle and Diana and found no sign that they had been exposed to the same foreign mental signature. But what Arthur is saying now-"

"They went after Jonathan, too," Lois breathed, carefully setting her coffee cup back on the table as if afraid she would drop it.

"I've been triangulating the data of this mornings attacks," Batman suddenly put in over the monitor. "It appears that Mr. Kent's seizures happened not more than 80 seconds before Superman was struck down over Wyoming. We are dealing with something or someone that could potentially attack with pinpoint accuracy two targets 609 miles apart-"

"Or something that could move really fast," Wally mused. "You said over a minute before..."

"J'onn?" Batman prompted.

A faint frown creased J'onn's face. Faster than thought, Wally zipped to the Martian's side to lay a careful hand on J'onn's shoulder. "J'onn?"

A tense silence reigned for a few beats, and then a heavy sigh escaped J'onn. "I'm sorry. I thought I could trace - or match - or -"

"J'onn," Batman's voice was sternly admonishing. "No extra risks. If you slip into the same -"

"I won't," J'onn dismissed with enough brusqueness to draw a startled look from Lois. "It's just frustrating. I feel like I should know, but - if there were another telepath - I'm sorry, Arthur, but someone stronger than you are-"

"I understand," Arthur reassured over the monitor audio.

"It just doesn't make sense," J'onn fretted. "What he's going through - if there's a telepath behind it, it's like - it's like someone used Mayavana-"

"What is Mayavana?" Lois demanded. "Who did this-"

"We're trying to find out, Lois," Batman interrupted coldly.

"Batman," J'onn chided. He closed his eyes. "I'm trying-"

"J'onn, stop," Wally murmured, feeling J'onn's body begin to tremble under the hand he still rested on J'onn's shoulder.

"Look, I'm not trying to say J'onn should do anything dangerous, I just want to know-"

"Mayavana is an extreme telepathic technique," Batman began with what felt to Wally like haste. Did it unnerve Batman to think of danger to J'onn? It must, Wally decided as he listened to Batman continue his explanation.

"Martians can handle Mayavana once in a lifetime. It is a way of recreating reality for the target of the technique, of altering their perceptions so they believe the world to be in whatever way the telepath crafts it."

"Wait, Martians can do it?" 

"There are no Martians besides J'onn, Lois," Arthur pointed out. "I should probably return to Jonathan and Martha -"

"Go ahead, Arthur," Batman dismissed. "J'onn, you say it's like Mayavana-"

"Much like it. The way Superman's reality is shifting I cannot decide if it is a more or less sophisticated attack -"

"How much of its similarity is a product of your efforts to stabilize what was done to him?"

J'onn hesitated. "I'm not-"

"Wait," Lois said again. "If a Martian can recreate reality for someone, why can't J'onn just go into Clark's mind and recreate the real reality for him?"

A good question, Wally noted, looking to J'onn with sudden hope and feeling that hope whither at the way J'onn's shoulders slumped.

"It's the way Batman explained - a Martian can perform the technique only once in a lifetime," J'onn said.

"And you've already used it," Lois realized. "Look, there must be something. How many telepaths are there? J'onn, can't you just scan the Earth or something and -"

"He can't," Wally answered for him, giving J'onn's shoulder a squeeze and then crossing back to Lois. "Not while he's protecting Superman's mind. And if he doesn't protect that-"

"There's no point to finding the bad guy," Lois finished, sinking down into a chair beside the table. "Dammit!"

"J'onn can't," Batman broke in, startling them into remembering he was still listening on monitor, "but maybe someone else can."

J'onn raised his head. "Bruce?"

"Wally, I need to get planetside. If you'll take monitor - J'onn, Lois, I've got something I want to look into and I will call you."

"I'm on my -"

"-way," Wally answered, the final word delivered in the heart of the monitor womb. He stopped still and blinked at the scenes of chaos raging around him. "My god!"

"I want to keep you in reserve in case we need another speedster. And someone needs to be on monitor, and J'onn can't."

Wally took a deep breath, watching shadows swallowing New York City. "I know. You're right."

Batman paused to look hard in Wally's direction. "Don't give them more to worry about," he ordered.

Wally met Batman's look evenly. "I won't. Figure it out."

"I will," Batman promised, turning and disappearing in the direction of the teleporters.

Wally did not watch him go, turning instead to the seemingly endless scenes of disaster on the planet below. A frightening number of JSA communicators were showing a lack of activity given the amount of action below - and the general "all call" distress beacon sounding from Dr. Mid-Nite's lab. He cut between views, catching a glimpse of what looked like a sandstorm in Manhattan, finding Wonder Woman in Paris lending her considerable strength to rescue and recovery of bomb victims, wincing at the demands for medical supplies and reports of heroes down.

No one was calling the Watchtower. They may have done so earlier, in which case Batman must have told them something. Probably not that Superman was badly hurt; that kind of news was too demoralizing to hear in a battle. More likely he had told a perfect truth - Superman was off planet and unavailable, as was Martian Manhunter.

Wally sighed, frustrated to not be down below, helping where he could. He understood why he was babysitting the Watchtower, but still -

"Wally!"

Lois' voice was panicked as it sounded through the monitor.

"Lois? What's wrong?" he answered, opening the video link.

He could see before she spoke. "Something's wrong with J'onn. I don't know-"

Wally forced his voice to be calming as he watched the writhing of the twisted form that J'onn had assumed. "Just hold on, Lois."

"Okay," Lois agreed shakily, "Just - hurry."

Wally tapped the keyboard impatiently, signaling Batman faster than the computer relays could register. "I am. I am."

End part 9

********

Mindstorm, part 10By Chicago

Disclaimers and canon notes: Much of this scene is more or less verbatim retelling of parts of JLA #86-87. 

***

The upper level of the conference room was in flames. Green Lantern was lying in a pool of his own blood.

...not real...

"Damn it, Superman get with it!!"

Superman swung unsteadily on his feet. "Batman? Where's ... where's J'onn? I--"

*Sleep Kryptonian.* The words were intoned inside his head, forcing him-

"No. No more distraction--"

"GNNNGH!" Superman cringed. The sorcerer - Manitou Raven - why - who -

...not...

"You must see! YOU MUST SEE-- HRRKT!"

Superman felt the third eye open in his forehead, and ... and .... "No," he breathed.

... not real...

*So you see now, do you? You finally see the truth.* 

...not the truth... not real...

Superman reeled, watched the fire build, watched as J'onn - how could J'onn be doing this? He had said he was going to fight his fear of fire but this-

...not real ... still fear...

Superman shook his head as he sat in the Fortress of Solitude with the rest of the League. "Martians choose their physical form as a reflection of their ideals-"

... not real... I wouldn't...

"To become this ... 'Fernus'-"

... NOT REAL... PLEASE...

Superman shook his head again as the doorway to phantom zone opened and spilled the guts of dozens - hundreds of white Martians - and J'onn - Fernus -

... not real... isn't real... Kal...

There was fire, fire everywhere, and Fernus' hands at his throat and he could, he would kill him because he could, and -

... not... no ... not real...

Lantern, from nowhere, rescuing...

...please... please Kal...

More flames, normal flames, not Fernus, at Stonehenge and Manitou Raven -

...who is Manitou Raven?... not real...

Manitou Raven asking, "What's in Metropolis?"

...Kal... not...

Lois. God, where was Lois? What was he-

...NOT REAL...

Superman felt his eyes forced open and there she was, her mouth open in a scream and everything shaking and he felt himself falling... falling... falling...

^^^^^^^

Wally was back on his feet before the ground under him quit shaking, dancing on the jumping floor of the monitor womb trying to hold the signal he had just established to Batman - or any signal at all. Before he was back to his station, every monitor from the planet had dropped its feed and the room was ablaze in red light and blaring sirens. Another second and a computer voice reported, "Danger. Moon orbit compromised."

"Fuck!" The ground was still heaving, and now the computerized voice had more to say.

"Hull breach in northeast living quarters. Danger. Moon orbit compromised. Hull breach in northeast living quarters."

"Seal northeast wing!" Wally barked, trying to patch a new feed to the medbay. After two futile seconds, he gave up. He could get there faster.

The red emergency light filled all the corridors on the way up, and he narrowly avoided a sparking live line as he dashed out of the monitor womb. The voice followed him. "Danger. Moon orbit compromised. Sealing northeast wing. Danger..."

The medbay door was jammed shut. "GodDAMMIT!" he cursed, slamming through the manual override code on the control panel to no effect. If he vibrated through the door would explode and shrapnel could - 

"Fuck!" he shouted again. If there was a hull breach in the medbay area and both J'onn and Superman were out of commission, he wouldn't have to worry about shrapnel hitting Lois. 

"LOIS! J'ONN!" he yelled at the top of his lungs. "I'M VIBRATING THROUGH. STAY CLEAR OF THE DOOR!"

That would have to be enough, he thought, speeding himself up and bursting through the door...

"Lois!" he called, eyes desperately scanning the scatter of equipment. The ground had finally stopped shaking, but the area where Superman had been was a shambles of overturned chairs and monitor equipment. A fine dust filled the air. "Lois!" he called again, noting with relief that the atmosphere seemed intact but now worried that somewhere in the rubble...

"Here, Wally!" Lois answered, and something in the pile of tangled equipment shifted.

"I'm coming!" he yelled back, already pulling away a heavy equipment cabinet that was... dented? He realized belatedly that it was really something too heavy for him to move, that he was getting help.

"J'onn?" 

Relief flooded him as a green shoulder pushed up against the fallen cabinet and an arm opened up to reveal a shaken but unharmed Lois Lane.

"What the hell happened?" she demanded.

"Something threw us out of orbit," Wally explained, his words echoed by the computerized voice from the hall. Why wasn't it sounding in here, he wondered? He shook off the question. "Are you okay?"

Lois accepted Wally's hand and climbed out from under J'onn's sheltering body. Wally realized suddenly that the Martian must have tented himself over Lois and Superman when the shaking started. 

"I'm fine," Lois confirmed. "J'onn?"

There was more shifting of equipment, and then J'onn was standing clear, Superman cradled in his arms. "Thank you, Lois, for breaking the hold his delusion had on me."

Wally blinked. "Wait. How-?"

Lois looked equally confused for a moment, then her brow cleared. "I didn't imagine it, did I? He opened his eyes."

J'onn nodded. 

"He did? Is he back? Does this mean-?"

"Wallace, stop." J'onn took a step forward only to drop to one knee, staggering under Superman's weight.

"Oh, hell, sorry. J'onn, here, Lois-" Wally slipped under Superman's arm and straightened, struggling with the dead weight of the Man of Steel as he partially relieved J'onn of his burden. Lois came around to the other side and offered her shoulder so that Superman was propped between them.

If he had any idea what was happening to him, he gave no sign.

"Clark?" Lois whispered.

"He's back in the delusion, Lois," J'onn reported wearily, scanning the medlab and spying a bed that was whole and relatively free of tangled metal. He crossed to it and set it upright. He stayed there for a moment, looking around the room and staring for a moment out the observation window. "H'ronmeer," he murmured.

In the hall, the computerized voice changed it's message. "Moon position stable. Northeast wing sealed. Moon position stable. Northeast..."

"J'onn?"

The Martian turned back to face Lois and Wally, then crossed the space between them to claim Superman from them. "The good news is we are not hurtling toward the planet," J'onn said as he settled Superman onto the new bed.

Wally heard Lois gasp beside him, and he thought he might have gasped as well. He hadn't considered the possibility-

"But the effect on the tectonic plates and - crap!" Wally took off, back to the monitor womb, back around the sparking cable and the debris strewn halls. His fingers went back to the keyboard, back to resecuring a line to the planet below, to anyone, anywhere.

All he got was static.

There were no monitor feeds.

There were no radio signals.

Just white noise.

He sat heavily one of the chairs fortuitously attached to the floor and stared at the empty screens, silently praying to whatever gods might be listening that his wife and unborn child were okay.

End part 10

*********

Mindstorm, part 11By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0" Air Wave's distress call is taken from JSA #49. 

Batman was already walking as he materialized in the Cave, striding purposefully toward the main computer terminal. "Oracle, the DEO files -"

"Already waiting for you - at least as much as I could hack. They've been experimenting with closed systems for their top secret stuff. Some of the files for that facility you had me investigate are probably there now. I picked up traces of them and could do partial reconstructions-"

Batman stared at the files that opened onto the monitor. "But not enough. And your hack into the compound itself?"

There was a snort over the line. "I'm lucky I got personnel records before they smelled me and took their system offline. But that's not a total loss."

New files began to load onto the screen. Batman scanned over the flagged documents, noting specialties, raising an eyebrow at a name he had known from STAR Labs. "Tan isn't at STAR anymore?"

"No. In fact, she's not *anywhere* except in this personnel file. No banking activity, no property in her name, nothing. It might be that she isn't working at this base anymore, either, but-"

"But she was on the initial team working up telepathic screening technologies," Batman remembered, his fingers flying over the keys. "All these names - they're all mind scientists?"

"Of one kind or another. Not quite a smoking gun-"

"And it doesn't explain Jonathan Kent," Batman pointed out. "Superman could be a target of opportunity, close by for the test of a new weapon, but it hit Jonathan first... Oracle, have you got a location on Mr. Terrific?"

If the non sequitur threw her, she gave no sign. "I've completely lost most of the JSA; the shadow activity over Manhattan has been as disruptive as bad solar flares."

"Damn. I was hoping - we need someone who can enter the mental realm. Another telepath or-"

"Mr. Terrific wouldn't be able-"

"No, but his team has the right kind of ties and he'll know who he can spare."

"Fate's out, unless you're thinking - Dr. Occult?"

"Poss-" Batman's answer was cut off by the sudden buzz of an emergency signal on the JLA line. Frowning he punched at the console. "Batman here."

"Bat-" Sudden static blasted over the line, punctuated by Oracle's "OH SHIT!" through his ear piece.

"Situation!" Batman demanded, typing furiously to bring up monitor views of the outside. His answer came both from Oracle and from the images that suddenly flooded his screens. 

"The moon - they've managed to pull the moon out of orbit! It looks like they're using it -"

"To eclipse the sun," Batman finished grimly. He watched the shadows beginning to take hold over the Manor grounds. "But no earthquakes, no effect on the tides. What-"

"I'm getting this distress call. Patching through now."

There was a hiss and pop of static, then, "...anyone read me out there, this is Air Wave of the JSA reserves broadcasting a distress call on every available frequency. We need your help."

"Air Wave? I thought-"

"Every JSA reserver is already pulled into this. Most of the regulars have disappeared from the grid in one way or another. I just cut Canary free from a mission to help in Philadelphia."

Air Wave's message was continuing in the background, explaining how three beings has pulled the moon out of orbit. "...only their power is keeping the world from cracking in half. For now anyway."

"Our people?" Batman asked, pulling up his own tracking software and trying to ignore the continuing static from the lunar feed.

"Lantern's still neck deep in rescue efforts on the Indian subcontinent." Batman listened to her report as he found Dick's location in the 'Haven, traced through the movements of his police radio. Tim's signaler showed him at Brentwood and hopefully safe. Oracle's voice continued, "Wonder Woman is helping in London." Cassandra's tracer was moving away from her cave under downtown Gotham. "I've still got Aquaman in Kansas."

"No moving any of them," Batman decided, new monitor views coming to life as the emergency signals began flooding in. There were heroes everywhere, spread too thin as thousands of ordinary citizens were possessed by Eclipso. He could see the telltale shadows on their faces, visible even in the eclipse gloom. "And the moon?" He did not let his tone hint at his worry.

Barbara heard it anyway; he could sense sympathy in her matter-of-fact tone. "I'm working on turning a satellite to their new position. Teleporters are definitely offline. Visual from an earth based telescope confirms the Watchtower is still standing."

Batman's mouth tightened into a line. He needed a plan. As fast as things were moving, getting Superman back into action was looking like a long shot at best, no matter how much they needed him. And the way things were moving, it was looking more like the question would be how to contain Superman if for some reason -

He felt a tickle at his wrist.

He blinked once. He had forgotten about Ace. He hesitated for a moment, remembering how hard it had been for J'onn to link to him when he had been up on the moon with him, but...

But he had to know. He could focus on a world saving plan if only he knew...

He ordered Ace to connect him to J'onn.

The zo'ok gave its usual wriggle of excitement, and Bruce could feel it extending telepathic energy. He waited a beat, then two, then exhaled the breath he had been holding. *Bruce?*

*J'onn! Are you all okay?*

There was the slightest pause. *We are no worse than we were. But we are worried for you. We cannot see the planet.*

*We're ... the Earth's not shaking apart. Oracle's working on - J'onn?*

*Sorry - too much -*

*Go,* Batman acknowledged. *I love you.*

*You,* J'onn echoed, and then the link was gone, leaving only a vague mental ache behind.

"Batman." That was Oracle again, snapping him out of his momentary longing to a more practical emotion. "You need to see what's broadcasting all over TV."

He leaned forward and kicked on the television signal. 

Lex Luthor was staring out of the screen at him from behind the Oval Office desk. "...crisis affecting the entire world. We cannot sit idly by and hope for superheroes to save us. I have convened an emergency meeting..."

Batman felt his lips curl into a snarl, and somewhere in the back of his mind, a niggling suspicion blossomed into a conviction.

End part 11

*******

Mindstorm, part 12By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0" Airwave's message taken verbatim from JSA #49, as are descriptions of Los Angeles.

-Calcutta-

Kyle Rayner had stopped consciously monitoring the JSA emergency channel. The ring was keyed to alert him if either of two phrases came across the bandwidth; otherwise he needed his concentration more than he needed news. 

Screams and cries still penetrated the rubble; the bombing had left many air pockets in the pancaked building. Shifting debris swiftly without collapsing it was a delicate business, and he almost lost a 500 pound section of reinforced concrete when someone abruptly ran into him. He caught the slipping weight with the ring and turned to say something to the man who jarred him, but he was already up and running away.

A lot of people were running away.

A lot more, Kyle realized, were standing and pointing and crying and prostrating themselves. He opened his mouth to bark an order, to bring them back to the task at hand, but then his eyes followed the pointing hand of a nearby rescue worker.

The moon.

The moon was practically racing across the night sky.

Around him the screams of the rescue workers joined those of the people trapped below mounds of rubble, a deafening cacophony. For a moment he worried the ring had reinitiated the JSA feed and he just couldn't hear it, but no, the key phrases had not been spoken.

No one said they needed Green Lantern to attend to a greater crisis, and no one breathed a word of news, good or bad, about the missing Jade and Sentinel.

The moon hurtled out of sight below the horizon, and under the green glow of the ring, Green Lantern continued his rescue efforts.

^^^^^^^^^^

-Paris-

A stereo system blared sound from the top floor of an apartment building, loud enough that Wonder Woman could catch some words as she flew by. "...under the sun is in tune, but..."

She had a feeling she didn't want to know the next lyric.

She had left London as an odd mix of London cops and US armed forces had taken over crowd control of Kobra driven rioters. She had not paused to wonder how the military units were so quickly on the scene; there was trouble across the channel and too few heroes to help.

The day already felt long, and this new crisis was barely an hour old.

The streets of Paris were like a war-zone, and from the news coming over the JSA emergency channel, the same scene was being repeated in every urban center of the world. She uncoiled her lasso as she hovered over one vicious knot of looters, ready to loop them all in the truth and hopefully break them out of their panic. A practiced toss collected dozens in her proverbial net.

It didn't stop them.

Hera help her, the truth only made things worse.

^^^^^^^^^

-Bludhaven-

Dick Grayson winced at the sudden flood of light that filled the streets downtown. For a confused moment, he thought the sun had broken free, but then his mind processed the sound of rotors.

Helicopters.

Blackhawks. Apaches.

Military helicopters, coming from god knew where and mounted with Kleig lights.

Undoubtedly there by Executive Order.

Luthor.

The crowd began melting away, no longer fighting him and his fellow officers, no longer intent on destroying the city center.

He would hate Luthor later. His radio was already crackling with calls for aid at another hot spot, bring riot gear.

He and Amy did not even look at each other as they dove into their car and answered the call.

^^^^^^^^^^^^

-Smallville-

Aquaman excused himself from Jonathan Kent's hospital room when his JLA signaler started sputtering with hurried reports of worldwide disaster. Martha Kent raised her eyes in query, and he had lied about having to take a call.

He knew that the mother of a superhero would know better, but she didn't stop him.

He walked down the hall and through the doors to the outside, bathed now in shadows from the total eclipse. 

The totally unnatural eclipse.

The unnatural eclipse which had sent the moon hurtling across the sky with Martha Kent's little boy aboard.

He tapped his communicator. "Watchtower?" he asked quietly.

There was only static.

He repeated his query.

Nothing.

Superman could survive a lot, as could J'onn. And the Watchtower was solidly built. Lois would be safe.

Arthur Curry, father of Arthur Jr., now long dead, made a decision. He would not give the parents of Cark Kent one more thing to worry about.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

-Los Angeles-

Shadow soldiers.

Pat Dugan hated it when villains mobilized innocents to do their dirty work.

He hated it more when the villains they fought against were former heroes.

Within the armor of S.T.R.I.P.E., Dugan fired tranquilizer darts into the crowd, watching the inky shadows explode away from those he hit, only to glom on to the next passing victim.

Around him, the remnants of Infinity, Inc. were shaking off retirement, following Hawkman into battle against Alan Scott's son.

Airwave's message continued to broadcast over all signals, sounding enough like a loop that Dugan would've thought it was a recording if he hadn't heard it vary with each repetition.

All except one phrase: "...kiss your loved ones good-bye before you leave."

Pat Dugan had kissed his wife, but his step-daughter was already among the missing.

He fired another round of darts.

End part 12

******

Mindstorm, part 13By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0"

Lois was torn between feeling unnerved and annoyed as yet another piece of equipment was righted at superspeed and a gust of wind signaled the departure of the Flash. He would be back in seconds, restlessly setting the Watchtower to rights between anxious glances at the single satellite feed he'd reacquired with help from Batman.

At least, that's what she thought he'd explained to her during a pause in his frantic activity.

There was another gust of wind, and Lois sighed and stroked her thumb over her husband's hand. She was almost startled when a voice answered her: "You get used to it."

She looked up and found herself meeting the bemused expression on the face J'onn J'onzz. "I'd rather not have to," she answered acerbically.

Across from her, J'onn inclined his head slightly in acknowledgment, the expression on his face a far cry from the half-fugue state he had fallen into after freeing them all from the rubble.

"You okay?" she asked, just to be sure.

As if on cue, the Flash showed up again, although this time he was moving at more human speeds. He balanced a tray bearing a carafe full of coffee from an automatic drip coffee maker and a pair of mugs, plus a package of Chocos. "I made coffee," he explained, an odd air of helplessness in his voice.

J'onn's bemused expression gave way to a gentle smile as he rose to his feet. "Thank you, Wally. Any more word from Earth?"

Wally shook his head. "Nothing good. Whatever magic the bad guys were using to hold everything together seems to be wearing off." He handed the tray over to J'onn but then looked at a loss for what to do with his hands. "There's just nothing really - the teleporters are off line and no one can afford to come fetch me and -"

"Wally," J'onn interrupted quietly as he set the coffee tray down and began filling the mugs, "I know it is hard to watch and be unable to help."

And how, Lois added mentally, glancing at Clark's still face.

"Yeah," the Flash agreed, still seeming fidgety even as he forced himself to stay and talk to J'onn.

J'onn set down the coffee carafe and set a hand on Wally's shoulder. "Nonetheless, that is where you are needed now. Lois and I will be fine."

There was a firmness in J'onn's tone that left no room for argument, and after a moment, Wally seemed to shake himself. "Okay, right, gotitsorryI'llheadback-" Whatever else he said was lost in the breeze of his departure.

J'onn looked after him and then turned back to Lois. "Cookie?"

She shook her head. "Just coffee, please. But don't let me stop you from-"

J'onn handed her a mug and displayed the stack of Chocos he had in his other hand. "I won't," he promised. He picked up the second mug from the tray and returned to his place at Superman's side.

Lois watched him over the rim of her mug as he devoured two Chocos and seemed to visibly relax toward his normal state - or at least the way Lois was used to him being.

"Flash will probably stay in the monitor womb for a while," J'onn noted, taking a small sip of coffee. "He'll keep a feed into this room in case there is another surge of negative activity in Kal El's mind -" he paused to give Lois a sympathetic look - "but he won't be listening.

Lois lowered her coffee mug. "Is that what's happening, when you sort of disappear into yourself? The delusions are stronger or-"

"Yes," J'onn answered. Then more quietly, "I'm sorry, Lois. I want to be able to just stop whatever is happening to him, but-" 

"Don't be silly," Lois shot back briskly. "I mean, yes, of course I want Clark back, but I think it's pretty clear you're doing everything you can."

J'onn met her eyes as she spoke, then let himself have another Choco. Lois watched the almost visible control he seemed to be exerting.

"You need those, don't you?"

J'onn glanced up sharply. "Kal El didn't tell you?"

Lois' lips curled in a fondly ironic smile and she reached to run her fingers over her husband's hair. "Clark knows he married a reporter. He doesn't tell me things about this life that might smell like story." She raised her eyes again. "At least, not things he thinks are important to his friends that he keep secret."

J'onn ate another Choco, then contemplated the last one in his hand. "Off the record," he began, "yes, I do. Bruce is still trying to figure out why, but -" J'onn shrugged and ate the final cookie.

"Ah, Bruce. Can't resist a puzzle."

"Or a test," J'onn confirmed. "Although he has Robin working on this question. We're still off the record, right?"

Lois chuckled and reached out to pat J'onn's arm. "I think this whole scenario pretty much has to be off the record," she pointed out.

"I suppose it would be hard to explain how you ended up on the moon when it was pulled from orbit. But what will you do for a story?"

"I'm somewhere in Wyoming at the - oh, you don't mean cover story!" Lois realized. "Well, it's time to let someone else win a Pulitzer over the near end of the world," she dismissed airily.

J'onn shook his head and rose to his feet. "You are good people, Lois Lane. More coffee?"

"Yes, please," she accepted, handing J'onn her mug. "Out of curiosity, did you put it into the Flash's head to bring us coffee?"

J'onn paused for second in the middle of pouring coffee, then resumed what he was doing. "I very rarely put ideas in anyone's head, Lois. He found Alfred's coffee pot, dented and spilled, and he thought we needed more coffee."

Lois accepted the mug J'onn handed her with a guilty twinge as he spoke. "I didn't mean any offense, J'onn. It just seemed-"

He reclaimed his seat, smiling slightly against her concern. "You are not a mind reader, Lois. You have no way of knowing what I am thinking nor of what things a telepath might find troubling even in suggestion." His tone was matter-of-fact, and he polished off another Choco after he finished speaking.

Lois took a thoughtful sip of coffee. "So for you it is wrong to put ideas in people's heads?"

"Morally repugnant, although occasionally tempting."

"Really?" Lois considered J'onn with interest. "When is it tempting? I mean, I'm guessing you wouldn't use it to pick up chicks or anything-"

J'onn chuckled, but Lois noted that something flared in his eyes. Anger? Or guilt? "No, not 'picking up chicks,'" he quoted back to her. He took a sip of his own coffee. "Sometimes it is the lesser of two evils when the world needs saving."

"Well, duh. But you didn't say that sometimes it was necessary. You said tempting."

J'onn set down his coffee and considered her for a moment. "I am beginning to have a new understanding of why powerful men have always been so attracted to you. Or maybe why you never dated anyone who wasn't powerful."

Lois grinned wolfishly. "Don't try to distract me, J'onzz. And don't worry, we're still off the record. When it is tempting?"

There was another moment's pause as J'onn ate another Choco. "You should keep this up; I can feel amusement from Kal."

Lois glanced down at her husband's face. "Amusement or irritation? He always hates it when I badger you."

"Me specifically?" J'onn sounded genuinely surprised.

"You're not getting me off topic that easily."

J'onn sighed. "So I see. Very well." He focused his whole attention on Lois, eyes meeting hers levelly. "Sometimes I want to avoid conversations and it is tempting to plant the idea that someone should drop a question."

The combination of the answer and J'onn's sincere gaze flustered Lois. "Oh! Are you serious?"

"It is very difficult to blindside a telepath with questions, Lois. But even I have things I do not want to say out loud."

Lois nodded slowly. "You know, I'm beginning to have a new understanding of why you're good for Bruce."

Lois was surprised when J'onn ducked his head at her comment, and she imagined a blush rising in his cheeks. "He's a good man," J'onn murmured.

"Oh, I know," Lois acknowledged quickly. "And he's a royal pain in the ass. In and out of costume."

"He's-" J'onn began, but Lois cut him off.

"You don't have to defend him, J'onn. I know you love him; that much has been obvious at every dinner Clark and I have had with you two in the last couple of years. But remember, I dated him once upon a time."

J'onn glanced down at Superman. "Now we are irritating him," he pointed out.

"And that's good, right? Because if he's irritated at me for dishing about Bruce then that means it's getting through all the delusions, and that might mean we can strengthen him enough to break through whatever's got a hold on him."

J'onn seemed to think about her analysis before he said, "You're very good at getting what you want, aren't you?"

Lois grinned again. "So tell me, is Bruce still fond of water sports?"

Lois expected a flustered reaction to her arch question, but she didn't quite expect the pained expression that flitted across J'onn's features before he meekly answered, "Yes."

She sat up straighter in her chair. "Whoa, wait, hold the phone here. J'onn, what the hell -"

"Lois-"

"No, we've already established my bulldog credentials. I'm prepared to accept that you don't want to talk about your sex life, but *that* was not just embarrassment."

"I apologize. I did not anticipate your question."

"Clearly. Now spill. You don't like that Bruce thinks the shower is a good place to get down and dirty?"

"It is not - Lois, Mars is a very dry place. It is an ... intense thing, to be submerged."

Lois blinked once. "Yeah, actually, I bet. And you've told Bruce this?"

J'onn turned his face.

"J'onn! How is he-"

"It makes him happy and costs me so very little-"

"J'onn, do you have any idea how much you sound like a battered wife defending-"

J'onn stiffened angrily. "Bruce does not-"

Lois lifted her hands in a calming motion. "I know, J'onn, I know. Just - listen to yourself. You should know better. A healthy relationship is based on give and take. You *have* to tell him-"

She watched his shoulders slump. "I know, Lois, I do. But Lois -" He gestured toward himself as if to point out how very alien he was.

"J'onn." She waited until she had his attention, then she gestured toward the Kryptonian lying unmoving between them. "I know a thing or two about the human side of this equation. Things like this - you have to let him know. Otherwise it will come out on its own, and he will be angry that you let him hurt you."

"He doesn't-"

"J'onn. You have to."

She held his gaze for a long time, watching the conflict playing in his eyes. "Maybe-"

"No maybe. I'm right about this, J'onn. Bruce can live without shower sex if he has to. And other things, too, because I'm guessing there's more you haven't told him."

J'onn started suddenly and fixed her with a penetrating gaze, and belatedly Lois realized he had picked a stray thought from her mind. "Don't you dare, Lois. If this has to be done, don't you dare say a word to him."

Lois pressed her lips together in a thin line. "J'onn, if you don't-"

"Lois, please. You wouldn't want me in the middle of your relationship with Kal."

Lois scowled and then nodded. "Fine. I won't."

"Promise?"

The plea was so sincere - and so unexpectedly child-like - that Lois was taken aback. She sighed and stood, taking her mug back to the table where J'onn had set the coffee pot. "Okay," she finally agreed. "I don't like it, but okay."

*Thank you.* The words were whispered straight into her mind, carrying with them a color of relief she normally associated with the realization the world wasn't going to end. And though she wouldn't break her promise, she wondered suddenly if she had done the right thing. 

End part 13

*******

Mindstorm, part 14By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0" 

It took a world wide disaster to open views in every possible monitor in Oracle's war room. They were all open now, but Barbara Gordon felt like she was still missing things.

The comlines were all buzzing, but no one had called her since Batman had signed off. No one wanted a run down of the big picture. They could see enough of it from where they were - enough to know that they could only keep doing what they were already doing. Protect the innocent. Save lives. Fight the bad guys - if you could.

Of 3,127 formally recognized superheroes world wide, 2,943 had responded to the growing crisis. Of those, less than 20 had a chance of succeeding in taking down the cabal of Mordru, Obsidian, and Eclipso, and even those top level metas and magicians would need to work in concert.

Sentinel was already among the missing.

So was Captain Marvel.

Mordru had taken over Dr. Fate's body.

Superman was a mindsnap away from berserker rage on the moon, and the Martian Manhunter was holding him prisoner. 

Green Lantern was in India, and no matter what fail-safes the ring had, no one wanted it anywhere near a battle where Eclipso could potentially sense it.

The djinn was lost to the battle when Jakeem's vocal cords were sliced.

The heroes still fighting that had the power to do anything were scattered, and there was no secure way to plan a coordinated assault through her network. Barbara Gordon, like the rest of the world, had to pray that the black shadow that seemed to have swallowed New York City and most of the JSA was hiding a battle against Mordru that would end in his defeat.

Oracle, on the other hand...

Her eyes scanned her monitors, tracking the signals of hundreds of heroes, some already down, possibly dead, others moving from disaster to disaster as quickly as they could. Electronic filtering software kept a steady feed of the most pertinent communiqué between comlinks chattering over her speakers, reports of where hospital units had been set up by UN and NATO support forces, reports of situations controlled and others exploding out of control, reports of increasing seismic activity as the natural forces of gravity and tectonic action fought to assert themselves against magical control.

She tapped open a channel. "Lantern."

"Oracle," he answered, sounding winded.

"You saw the moon." He would know what she meant. He'd had to hold the earth together before.

"Yeah. Need me?" 

"Be ready," she advised, glancing at a feed from STAR Labs.

"Getting clear," he replied. "Lantern out."

Barbara leaned back, trying to anticipate trouble spots. Back when the quake had happened in Gotham, there had been - she closed her eyes. If anyone survived...

No, assuming failure meant lack of preparedness for all the potential degrees of success. She needed to focus on what disasters she could avert or control so the whole world wasn't a No Man's Land, caught between roving gangs control by... costumed freaks and -

Her fingers snapped to the keyboard, her heart in her throat. STAR Labs had already indicated polar earthquakes. What if-?

She felt herself release a held breath as a peaceful scene of the Antarctic desert replaced the chaos on one monitor. The Slab was still intact, still standing and - she frowned a little and opened a new comlink.

"Plasticman?"

"Heya, Oracle. New orders, or just checking in?"

Orders? Batman, she realized, wondering when he had sent Plas to the south pole. "Checking in,"

"Rest of the world's still standing then," he chirped. "Me and Mr. Miracle were wondering. Worrying, actually, because we're working on our three card monty and-"

"All is under control?" she interrupted.

"If the earth starts shakin', I've got the foundations while he puts the whole facility out of phase. Nifty trick that whole Black Mass mess left this place with. Tell Bats we say hi."

She closed her eyes for a second, relieved. "Oracle out," she whispered, knowing her software would pick up the sound and amplify it to normal tones. Eel would feel appropriately dissed by the uberserious Bat affiliates.

A klaxon sounded and she snapped to attention, reaching for her keyboard to signal Green Lantern as the first of the real tremors began. She would contact Wonder Woman next to go to Tokyo, and then - 

A squeal of feedback sounded, sending her reeling back in her chair, hand clapped to her ear. The lights flickered, sputtering before the back up generator kicked in. She ripped her earpiece out and rubbed at her ear, pushing herself back to her keyboards as the monitors around her slowly rebooted.

Every one of them came up blank.

End part 14

***********

Mindstorm, part 15By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0" Significant chunks of description and dialogue directly quoted from Superman: Man of Steel #131 (Shultz) and Action Comics #796 (Kelly). 

"Superman!" Steel's voice, professional but edged with worry over the psionic link. "We've been trying to hail you... it's Lois ... she went AWOL from the safehouse..."

Superman's fists balled tighter as he cut through the mesosphere, making a bee line for Metropolis. Steel's voice continued to buzz in his head, reporting that Jimmy thought she had gone to their apartment-

/I'm here, Clark./

He shook off the echoes of his wife's voice. She needed him. God, he should have known, all those other villains... distractions. He burst through the window of his floor, flying full tilt to the door of their apartment, graffitied with his own logo in red and he could smell it was blood...

/Clark. Hold my hand. Please-/

He blasted through the door, and the bastard didn't even flinch. Just took another drag off his cigarette before saying, "Yeah, you're good. But you're not that good, mate."

The blood was everywhere, overwhelming his senses as his knees buckled.

"Fact is," Manchester Black continued, "you're a little late this time."

/Don't let it take you again, Clark. I know -/

She was still alive, barely. He could hear her heartbeat over her voice in his head. The memory of her voice. Because her mouth was slack and open and-

Manchester Black was still speaking, drawing the focus of his mind. "...little tweak... That heartbeat you're... Ain't hers. Idiot. S'mine."

/Clark, you can't do this again. I'm not sure J'onn-/

"Lois is dead."

"No. No." He could barely hear himself, much less Black. His whole body shook as Black kicked her corpse to prove his point. She wasn't in it. She was dead. Dead.

/Clark, I love you. Please-/

"...piety pourin' out of you... telling me how the damn world works... sparing my life. Bet that looks like a big screw-up now, don't it?"

/It's an illusion, Clark. Whatever you're seeing.../

"Why?" He had to ask. Because Lois' murder was so senseless, so-

"Because I hate you. Because you're stupid. Because I wanted to pull you out of your tower and show you beyond question how the bloody world works for real people!..."

Black was ranting, telekinetically animating Lois body, making her sway up to her knees, making her monstrous with her blood soaked hair and empty features and -

"How does it feel?" Black was asking, and the rage bubbled up in Superman.

"You're the telepath," he growled. "READ MY MIND." He slammed into Black, took the fight out over the skyline, blasting him with heat rays that did nothing, pounding fists toward him only to have them bounce off his shielding. A telekinetic blast sent Superman spiraling down to the street below, cracking concrete as he landed, and it didn't hurt so much as his heart-

"You need more incentive to fight like a man?" Black crowed. "How about a telepathic retrospective on your wife's last hour of life?"

/Clark, can't you feel me squeezing your hand? I'm right here, no matter what-/

"NO MORE TALKING!" Superman roared. "THIS ENDS NOW!"

/Clark - Smallville! Stop it! Right now! I'm blowing the story of a lifetime here to hold your hand and hope the Martian sitting next to you doesn't explode from trying to keep you sane, and I'll be seriously upset-/

*Lois?* He reached out, feeling the familiar contours of J'onn's telepathic link...

Everything went black.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Lois could feel the silk of her blouse sticking to her sweat as everything began shaking again and J'onn slumped in the chair across from her. "What now?" she groaned.

As if on cue, the Flash appeared. "The moon-" he began, then looked at J'onn. "Shit, what happened?"

Lois shrugged wearily. "More of the same." The ground seemed to heave, throwing J'onn from his chair and forcing Lois to grab hold of the structural support column that they had stationed themselves beside.

Wally joined her, clinging tight and, she suspected, ready to zip her to safety. "I reinforced the support shields," he yelled over the rumble and crash of falling equipment. "The Watchtower will hold together."

"What's happening?" she shouted back.

"I think they've won downstairs! I lost the feed from Earth, but the moon is going back to its orbit!"

The ground seemed to roll under them, making Lois feel seasick. Superman's bed tipped, angling toward her and Wally for a moment before swaying back to topple him on top of J'onn's unmoving form. Lois started to reach forward instinctively, but Wally stopped her.

"They're fine!" he pointed out. "This can't hurt them!"

A groaning sound vibrated through the column she and the Flash clung to. She shot a horrified look at him. "You're sure it will hold?"

He reached out and took her hand. "We've got too much to live for for it to fail!"

She bit back a sarcastic retort as a supply cabinet crashed to the floor, shattering glass beakers and test tubes that somehow had survived the first displacement of the moon. 

And then the shaking stopped.

Both she and Wally stayed where they were, blinking at the sudden silence and stillness. Then Lois felt her knees give in delayed reaction.

The Flash caught her before she hit the floor, lowering her the final inches to the ground. Lois giggled in embarrassment. She looked around the medbay, noticing with relief that J'onn was beginning to move. "Aren't you glad you cleaned his place up?"

She was half-surprised when Wally pushed back his mask and gave her a rueful smile. "You know, I used to dream about a world that moved closer to my speed," he confessed, joining her in examining the rubble. "After the last three hours? Not so much."

Lois closed her eyes and swallowed hard. "Only three hours?"

"Lois?" that was J'onn's voice, and she opened her eyes to see the Martian sitting up, studying her with a concerned expression. Too concerned, actually, and she realized how deeply sucked in to Superman's latest delusion he had been.

"I'm fine," she promised. She reached forward to where her husband's head rested against the steel floor and smoothed back the curl over his forehead. "Fine."

End part 15

**********************

Mindstorm, part 16By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0" Scene constructed around pp.39-41 of JSA #50. 

Sanderson Hawkins came back to himself through a storm of rage that died to total confusion as he opened his eyes - OPENED HIS EYES - a skill that felt a thousand years from any he had used in a long time. He tried to extend his suddenly restored consciousness to his legs and arms, but he buckled anyway, half caught by a hero that looked for all the world like Uncle Sam. What the hell was Uncle Sam-

Then the pain slammed into him, and he knew it wasn't new pain, just that he had misplaced it for a minute or two, and through the haze he heard Uncle Sam's voice. "...magic is wearin' out. Shake it off, Sand."

Sand bit his lip and forced his legs to work, staggering as Uncle Sam helped him to his feet. "Sand," a woman's voice said, and he shook his head to clear his vision. Phantom Lady. What was she doing here? And why was she taking off her -

"Probably a good idea to cover yourself," she suggested with a faint smile as she draped her cape over his shoulders. He was naked, he realized, too headsore and muddled to feel the embarrassment he knew he normally would. "Alex took out Eclipso and Alan's back with Todd." He nodded, even though she might as well have been speaking Kwakuitl for all the sense he could make of it. "Mordru - well, I think those two will know more." She nodded toward Black Canary and Dr. Occult, who were both struggling to their feet on the broken concrete.

Sand fought for his voice, directing his attention to the one hero he felt he actually knew of the gaggle he could see around him. "What's-" He swallowed hard and tried again. "What's... going on, Canary?"

Her answer was brisk and both what he needed to know and not. "Philadelphia just got hit with a six-point-o on the Richter scale, Sand."

That explained the pain, he thought to himself, and almost as if on cue, it rose up in him again - a sensation like bile rising in his throat, only sharper, more acidic and stretching through his arms and legs as well.

KRAKOOM!

Every hero spun toward the building that had finally crashed down under the damage done to it by whatever had torn up the streets, and a very bad idea of some of that cause began to niggle at the back of his brain.

The nausea forced the thought back, and he struggled to listen as Uncle Sam began to talk again. "We're not out of the woods yet, kids. Thanks to Mordru and his cronies shifting the moon's orbit, the geodynamics of the entire planet are completely screwed up."

Moon out of orbit? God, that would mean - Sand clutched at his stomach, trying not to hunch too obviously under Phantom Lady's cape. Not that anyone would have noticed, given that the earth under their feet was beginning to shift with an ominous rumble. He felt Uncle Sam touch his shoulder, and he grimaced. "I can feel it -- tectonic plates slipping. Earthquakes and volcanoes erupting along the inland mountain chains." And it hurt. It hurt desperately, forcing him to speak through gritted teeth.

"Can you stop it, Sand?"

Sand forced himself to straighten. The Earth was screaming, and it hurt. It shot like fire through his veins, but if couldn't stop it, how many millions would die? He forced himself to press his feet against the ground to get a running start, letting Phantom Lady's cape fall from his body. "I can try," he called, and then he dove, plunging through the broken concrete of the sidewalk, sliding through foundations and around layers of pneumatic tubes and vapor sealed subway tubes, penetrating down to bedrock.

He didn't know what had been happening - or for how long - before he had returned to consciousness of himself. He had an idea of what might have been done to him. The rage storm he had passed through - he'd been through it before. That time he'd been unconscious of himself for years and knew what he'd been only from the videos. 

A monster. He had been a mindless, raging monster.

He suspected it had happened again, that somehow, someone had figured out how to release the beast he had thought was permanently caged. He didn't dare think how many he might have maimed or worse. He couldn't dare. He needed to focus.

The deep rooted steel of New York City finally gave way as he penetrated deeper, past the levels that humans could dream of reaching. He slipped through the upper mantle and into the asthenosphere, stretching his mind and body along lines geomagnetically mapped into his very being.

The earth was shattering, and it still hurt. Hurt more, hurt *personally*, as if every pressured fault line were a rib or a femur or a vertebra in his own body. Whatever had been done on the surface echoed hard and deep, searing through the beauty around him with an agony that somehow didn't decrease the beauty but made it different, changed it in a way no one else could possibly understand.

He was deep in the earth's core now, stretched out with every fiber of himself, and mixed with the wracking pain and the deep beauty was ... fear. He chided himself, realizing what the fear was.

It was fear of death. And in truth, he wasn't sure it was entirely his fear. 

The Earth trembled around and through him.

He steeled himself, told himself to think of Wes. Wesley Dodds, his mentor, his friend. A man who lived and died heroically. Sand remembered the dream he'd had when Wesley died, the sand dissipating through his fingers, the phone call that woke him and confirmed his fears.

Wesley Dodds had thrown himself off a mountain in Tibet to prevent Mordru from stealing information from his mind. Sanderson Hawkins would stretch through that same mountain to prevent Mordru from destroying the Earth. He would not be afraid.

Sand made himself anew at the Earth's heart, exercising his control of his silicate form to heal the rifts and cracks and pressure points, making himself the heart of it all...

And it was too much. He tried too big, too hard, and it was tearing him apart, more powerful than he could hope to be. He snarled and embraced his own hubris, fighting harder, feeling his sense of self begin to discorporate on the waves of the world. Every pulse of his being sheared away from every other, rending him past his soul...

"NNNNGGAAAHHHHHHH!!!!" he screamed.

The rest was silence.

^^^^^^^^

"Well, haven' seen one of yer type around in a while."

Sand did not open his eyes, trying to register what was happening. 

He didn't hurt anymore. 

"Fine. Don' mind me. I'm just puttin' up scenery."

There was warmth on his face, like sunlight. And a breeze, he realized, scented of wildflowers and damp soil. He could feel blades of grass under his fingers.

"Well, yer not doin' me any good lying there."

Sand finally opened his eyes, then blinked rapidly several times. A scarecrow thin - man? - with a jack-o-lantern for a head leaned over him.

"Good. Yer awake. I imagine the master'll be wantin' to see you soon, then."

Sand rolled his head carefully and then gingerly sat up. 

It still didn't hurt.

"Where - is this -" Spit it out, he told himself, looking at the odd creature who was standing beside him and... smoking? "Is this heaven?"

The huge grin on the pumpkin face widened, and laughter spilled out. "HAR HAR HAR! Heaven! That's a good one. What, boy, you think yer dead?"

Sand nodded, accepting the pumpkin man's hand and rising to his feet. "I was trying -" He paused, screwing up his face in concentration. He had been doing something important.

"Savin' the world, yeah, I know. Felt the ripples, y'know. You did it, by the way." The pumpkin man was lighting a new cigarette.

Sand cocked his head to one side. That must have been it. "Good," he acknowledged absently, brushing his hands over his body. He frowned. "Should I have -?"

"Clothes?" the pumpkin man supplied, and suddenly he had them, odd vestments that rested lightly on his skin. "Apparently so. What's yer name, son?"

"Sand," he replied absently, fingering his new clothes. They felt - not like cloth. More like ... flower petals and spring leaves and dandelion down.

"Well, Sand," the pumpkin man said, holding out his hand again, this time obviously for a handshake which Sand provided. "Pleased ta meetcha. I'm Mervyn Pumpkinhead, but everyone jus' calls me Merv. Welcome to the Dreaming."

End part 16

**********************

Mindstorm, part 17By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0" 

The front passenger tire of the Batmobile was hanging over the abyss. There were ominous splashing noises coming from the underground river far beneath the working levels of the Batcave. The crashes of china and glass above had stopped.

Batman carefully rose from the floor near the computer station and righted his chair as the Bat computer slowly came back to life. For the first time, he was grateful for the quake that had hit Gotham three years ago. The pressure on the tectonic plates beneath the city, beneath his home, had not had time to rebuild. Not the way it had under Philadelphia, to judge from the destruction evident on the intermittent feed appearing on monitor 7.

"Master Bruce?" Alfred, an odd emotional strain in his voice that Dick had once identified as the "please don't be dead" tone.

"Here, Alfred," Batman called back, hearing relief in the footsteps coming down the stairs. "Are you all right?"

"Fine, Master Bruce, although I cannot say as much for the contents of the china cabinet. And the clock seems to have been sprung off its hinges again."

Batman frowned to himself. The way the clock entrance to the Cave was designed, that shouldn't have happened. He would have to bring John Stewart in to do some structural consulting.

"My word, that looks bad," Alfred remarked, noting monitor after monitor stuttering to show scenes of destruction. "Is there any-"

"Flash to anyone! I repeat, this is the Flash-" Batman reached for the volume control on the suddenly blaring speaker and opened a comline. 

"Go ahead, Flash."

"Batman, thank god! I've finally re-established our satellite feeds, although at least three-quarters of the hardware in orbit is on the fritz. Looks like electromagnetic interference. I've tried six of our nine emergency channels and this is the first to get through -"

"Have you reached Oracle?" Batman asked, typing in a diagnostic command for the various power and communications grids in Gotham.

"No luck so far," Flash admitted. "It looks awful down there. I can pick out at least a dozen cities on the night side of the planet from the fires."

"Understood," Batman said tersely. Most of Gotham was without power. Oracle should have a backup generator, though, and the Clocktower was quakeproofed. He scowled, then punched in a code for one of the Gotham private emergency lines. "Flash, try reaching Oracle on this frequency," he suggested.

"Trying," Flash responded, not questioning the request. "Eureka! Batman, patching the lines together and-"

"Batman?"

"Oracle, status."

The synthesized voice almost sounded relieved. "Most of my systems are off-line. I've managed to hook into a JSA channel. Obsidian and Eclipso have been neutralized, but they're less certain they got Mordru. I've been able to contact several heroes through Dr. Mid-Nite's communications array to start mobilizing clean up and support."

Batman grunted an acknowledgment. "Flash, Watchtower situation?"

"Had to seal off the northeast living quarters. We probably lost that whole section of the Tower. Otherwise just a lot of mess."

"And the others?"

Flash paused for just long enough to make Batman uneasy. "It's pretty touch and go. I'm not sure how much longer J'onn can contain the situation."

Batman closed his eyes, aware of Alfred's concerned look, but he did not pause before he spoke. "Okay, that's our new priority. That and communications. Oracle -"

"I've got a line on Dr. Occult," she cut in smoothly. "He's with Canary." She paused for a moment, likely to contact her operative, and then the voice was back, sounding somehow grimmer. "The JSA lost Sand. He's the one who stopped the earthquakes."

"Not Lantern?" Batman asked.

"I couldn't get him deployed, and it wouldn't have matter anyway. The kind of large scale destabilization -"

"We'll debrief that later," he interrupted brusquely. "Flash, how soon can we get the teleporters functional?"

"Not sure," the Flash confessed. "No one else up here can cover comm if I get involved in the teleporters. It's going to depend-"

"Communications first," Batman decided. "And Oracle, see if we can get someone else up to the moon - preferably JLA. They already know what's happening up there. Flash, tell J'onn and Lois just to hold on a little longer, but contact me if something changes with their situation. And let me know if you get the teleporters operational enough for inorganic transport."

"Roger that," the Flash answered. "Any specific inorganic?"

Batman thought about the kryptonite still sitting in his vault. "Let's make that need to know."

"Batman," Oracle jumped in, "I've got Wonder Woman available to transport Dr. Occult to your location and then offer support on the moon. I still can't raise Green Lantern. And you might want to tune in to the emergency broadcast system."

"Understood. Establish a universal emergency channel for all teams, then triage and deploy. Send Lantern as soon as you reach him. Batman out."

He switched his comset back to standby as Oracle and the Flash began talking to each other. Batman nudged the volume on the national emergency broadcast channel. Lex Luthor's voice flooded the Cave. 

"... worst of the external threat has passed. Again we have been terrorized and frightened by villains seeking vengeance against the superhero community, but the whys of this day's horror are a subject for another day. What is important now is that we work together. FEMA and National Guard units are already mobilizing in -"

"He's right," Alfred stated.

Batman spun to face the older man, noting the weariness in his frame as he scanned the scenes of destruction. "Alfred?"

A strange resignation was in Alfred's eyes as he met Batman's gaze evenly. "We will all need to work together," he clarified, although somehow that didn't seem to be all he was saying. "If you will excuse me, Master Bruce, I should stay by the phone upstairs. I imagine some lines will be active soon, and I can assure your CFO that you have authorized any level of relief expenditures he deems advisable."

Batman nodded. "Of course." He thought again about the kryptonite, about Superman's incapacitation, about villains seeking vengeance. "Do that," he agreed, his mind already moving to the next puzzle. He reactivated his link to Oracle. 

"Go ahead, Batman."

"Has Wonder Woman arrived in New York yet?"

"She's almost there. Why?"

"Have her take Dr. Occult to Smallville instead. I think he needs to talk to Aquaman."

"Will do. Oracle out."

Batman considered for a moment, then he reopened his files on Masters, the facility in Wyoming, experts on mind control, and Lex Luthor.

End part 17

****************************************

Mindstorm, part 18By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0"

"Flash, I've got Mr. Terrific on line. He's got an idea to get us more subnetworks."

"Thank god," the Flash reacted. He and Oracle had been struggling to make communications work for the hundreds of superheroes working around the globe. The universal signal had not been so hard to create, even though they had to stay well away from the broadcast frequencies the various world leaders were using. The problem was the communications chaos that resulted when there was only one fully functional channel. 

Had there only been team heroes involved, it would have been easier. There were protocols for sharing communications lines. But so many reservists and independents had been pressed into duty that even triage of messages was proving near impossible.

"Flash," Terrific greeted over the mercifully limited JLA line.

"Talk to me, Terrific," Flash directed into his com, his hands busily rewiring various Watchtower functions.

"I've been looking at the Martian tech in the JLA communicators. At first I thought it was incompatible with the Thanagarian tech we're using, but I tried tinkering with it anyway."

Wally pulled himself out from under the monitor console and whisked down to the teleport bay. "They'll work together?"

"The Martian tech is pretty malleable - semi-organic stuff," Terrific reported. "It started adapting to the Thanagarian wavelengths and multiplying them when I married the two communicators."

"Great, they're breeding. Shit!"

"Flash?" That was Oracle.

"Not you. This damned teleporter. The communications thing is great news, but that doesn't help with all the indies out there."

"Actually," Terrific contradicted, "if the other systems react the way the JSA's did, it might. But we'll need you to disseminate the signal."

Wally zipped back to the monitor womb. "Oracle, you got us connectivity?" he checked.

"Give me a sec to reconnect you to the universal channel."

Wally winced in anticipation of the previous flood of sound, but clearly Oracle had been successful in establishing a working pecking order. She must have recruited AirWave and Atom, among others, to get the message out so swiftly. 

"Okay," Oracle stated, "standby, Flash. Attention on the universal channel. Mr. Terrific has discovered a way to remotely activate multi-channel potentiality in all your comlinks. Please listen to the entirety of his message before jumping back on line. Message to commence in 30 seconds." There was a click, and she was back on the JLA line. "Mr. Terrific?" she prompted.

"Flash, if you'll link the JLA channel through the universal channel via satellite, I should be able to make this work."

"Do I have to pay attention to this?" Wally asked worriedly, glancing at the remote teleport console. He needed to get the teleporters working.

"Just hook me up and you can go," Mr. Terrific assured him.

"Already done," Wally replied, flipping a switch. "You'll go live as soon as Oracle gets the signal downstairs."

"Live in 3... 2..."

Wally turned down the com signal and snapped to the diagnostic report printing across the room. His eyes scanned the page in a futile effort to find a sign of how to work around the upper level electromagnetic disturbances that promised to scatter the molecules of anything coming up from the planet.

A sound at the door ripped his eyes from the paper.

"Lois? What-"

She was walking as if in a trance, glassy-eyed as she entered the monitor womb and turned to close the door. As soon as the door slid shut, however, she recoiled, blinking rapidly. 

"Lois?" he asked again, trying to mindful of his speed as he crossed to her side.

Her eyes were confused. "He sent me away. J'onn just -"

"Alert! Observation bay partition activated. Alert! Observation bay partition activated. Alert! Ob-"

"Shit!" Wally shouted, tearing over to the internal monitoring equipment. A low rumbling was sounding through the Watchtower.

"Wally? What's going on? What is the observation bay partition?"

Wally slammed his hand on a button, silencing the computer alert. "It's the airlock between the monitor womb and the upper levels of the central Watchtower. C'mon, c'mon," he urged the computer, trying to coax the medbay monitors to clear up enough for him to see what was going on.

He could feel Lois move to a position a few feet from him, out of the way but close enough to watch what he was doing. "Wally - Flash - "

He spun to face her. "J'onn sent you down. It looked like he just put coordinates in your head. Did he even give you a choice?"

Lois blinked. "No. We were just sitting there talking and suddenly he just... *looked* at me. And then I was walking down here. What does that -?"

The Watchtower gave a little shudder, and Flash glanced up. "Well, that's the airlock sealed. Lois, let's hope that doesn't mean what I think it means."

Her eyes scanned his face, and he saw her wrestling with something she didn't want to acknowledge. "J'onn's lost him, hasn't he?" she whispered.

"I don't know. I wish I could-"

The monitor womb suddenly rocked around them, forcing Lois to grab a console for balance. "Please tell me the moon isn't moving again," she pleaded.

"That wasn't a moonquake," Wally replied grimly, opening up the JLA channel. "Oracle, I need Batman," he stated, starting when Lois touched his arm.

He followed her pointing finger to the now clear monitor.

"Batman," the Dark Knight signed on.

"Batman, we've got code blue up here. Repeat, we've got code blue."

His eyes were riveted by the monitor screen. J'onn and Superman were circling one another, feinting and testing one another's stances.

"Full status, Flash!" Batman barked. 

"Blue is still contained. The affected area has been sealed off, and Green is keeping Blue occupied."

"Teleporter?"

"I still can't bring it on line, even for inorganics. Lantern?"

"Oracle?"

"I still can't raise him. His tracker went live when Terrific sent his signal. Still in Calcutta, but it hasn't moved."

Superman suddenly rushed forward, slamming J'onn's body toward the wall of the medbay. The Martian phased out of the Man of Steel's grip, but the Watchtower still rocked with the impact of Superman's body.

Batman's voice came back on line. "Protocol Zed, Flash," he said flatly. "Green knows it. Advise if Green is overpowered. We will continue working on this end. Batman out."

"Right," Wally breathed, watching hypnotically as the two combatants returned to circling.

"What's Protocol Zed?" a voice asked at his elbow. Lois. He'd forgotten her for a moment. "Wally?"

That was her husband in there. Hell, Superman was ... Superman. A paragon of virtue, the very exemplar of superherodom. And her eyes were as scared as Wally knew his must be. "Don't worry," he tried to reassure her. "As long as there's no fire, J'onn can contain him."

She was watching as intently as Wally, her fingers tight on Wally's wrist as Superman's eyes began to glow. "And if there's fire?" she asked.

"That's why J'onn sealed us in. Then he can break through the wall of the Watchtower, take the fight into space."

Superman's heat vision seared through a once more insubstantial J'onn. Wally felt Lois hold her breath as sparks flew from the cabinets hit by the rays from her husband's eyes, but no flames started. He realized when he exhaled in relief that he'd been holding his breath, too.

"And then?" Lois prompted.

"J'onn will keep the fight in the vacuum until Superman tires. He'll probably try to get him to the dark side of the moon."

On the monitor, a clearly enraged Superman caught hold of J'onn's body and began squeezing. Wally felt his stomach knot as J'onn's form lost shape, seemed to collapse under the bone shattering hold. The sickened feeling only intensified when J'onn flowed on the ground to slide viscously behind Superman and rise behind him. When Superman turned, J'onn slammed a punch into his jaw that carried Superman into the medbay wall at high speed. The Watchtower rocked again, and when Superman got up, a red light flooded the medbay.

"Hull breach," Wally interpreted. "A small one. The autorepair function might be able to seal it."

"He doesn't know it's J'onn," Lois said, and Wally didn't answer, knowing she was reminding herself, not him.

Superman flung himself at J'onn again, eyes blazing.

"And if they end up outside? Behind the moon? That's Protocol Zed?" Lois asked.

Superman's heat vision burned across a sheet on one of the beds, starting a small flame. J'onn danced away, his own eyes sending beams at the place where Superman had fallen earlier. For a moment new chaos reigned as all the smaller objects in the medbay began rolling and tumbling toward the hull breach. The flames flickered out.

"No," the Flash replied to Lois' question. "J'onn won't initiate Protocol Zed unless Superman tries to get to the planet."

One of the medbay exam tables slammed against the hull breach, and a dozen flying objects dropped to the ground. Superman and J'onn resumed their circling.

"If he gets to the planet like this..." Lois began.

"He won't," Wally stated firmly.

"But if -"

"Protocol Zed," Wally interrupted. He tore his eyes away from the screen to look at Lois. "You remember when we kicked Batman out of the League, all the issues about fail-safes?"

Lois shot another glance at the monitor then returned her attention to the Flash, nodding in acknowledgement.

"The complaint wasn't that he had developed protocols against us."

"I remember. It was the secrecy, the plotting."

Wally nodded, not letting himself look at the monitor as another blow rocked the Watchtower. "It made us make explicit an assumed protocol."

"Protocol Zed?" He had her full attention now.

"If any of us ever went so far off the deep end we couldn't be called back, if we became a danger to the earth and everything we loved-"

"J'onn would know."

Wally nodded again. "And he would stop us. Any of us." He touched his temple significantly. "It was nothing for him to make you a puppet long enough to get you out of harm's way." The Flash looked back to the monitor, not wanting to see the dawning realization in Lois' eyes. "It'd be even easier for him to cut the strings."

But he wouldn't have to, Wally told himself, watching as J'onn and Superman wrestled in midair in the medbay. 

"Protocol Zed," Lois said softly, and Wally didn't dare look to see if she was crying.

End part 18

***********************************

Mindstorm, part 19By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0"

Despite the speed of Mercury, it took a few minutes for Wonder Woman to cross the Atlantic. By the time she arrived in Manhattan, the last of the Earth's convulsive shudders had completely settled, and most of the bedraggled looking JSA had gathered downtown near the demolished courthouse.

She picked Dr. Richard Occult easily from the crowd. His trench coat and fedora were dusty, but otherwise the disaster area around him seemed to have left him untouched. She settled lightly beside him and gave a nod to Dinah Lance. The other woman looked tearful, and many of the JSA members seemed badly shaken, but she didn't have time to concern herself with what losses they might have suffered. "Dr. Occult," she greeted. "Has Batman briefed you at all?"

"The Oracle was insistent that such a briefing would require a secure line," he answered, walking a few steps to draw her away from the JSA and other assembled heroes.

"That means no, then," Diana interpreted. "I know you have your own means of transport, but it would probably be best if I fly you and brief you on the way."

Occult nodded his head once and raised his arms enough for Diana to get a good hold on him. She did so and lifted them both into the air. Behind them a loud BOOM sounded, but she didn't turn, and, she was pleased to note, neither did Occult. He knew whatever work he had was in front of him, and the JSA had to be trusted to fight their own battles.

"Superman has been attacked," she said to him as soon as they were clear of the city. "At least, it looks like an attack. Several hours ago. Before all this -"

"What kind of attack?"

"Something on the psychic level."

Dr. Occult grunted. "That's a telepath's area of expertise."

"We know. J'onn J'onzz has been working with him. But whatever it was was designed to create a psychotic break. J'onn was able to stabilize Superman, but not help him."

"J'onzz couldn't help him?" Occult sounded surprised.

"I can't tell you much more than that. Aquaman might be able to. He's in Kansas."

"Hence the flight over the cornbelt." The comment was uninflected, but she sensed an irony in him anyway. She supposed it didn't seem a very logical place to find an Atlantean, but she couldn't explain that Arthur was with Superman's parents.

"Is Superman also in Kansas?" Occult asked.

"No, no. On the moon."

"Off planet. Batman does have a way with the truth." Again that underlying implication of irony.

Wonder Woman's comlink buzzed. "Wonder Woman here," she acknowledged.

"It's Oracle. We've got a code blue on the moon. ETA with Occult?"

Diana suppressed the emotion rising in her. "Two minutes. You have the teleporter ready?"

"Negative. Batman says it shouldn't matter to Occult if he's right about what happened in Smallville."

"And if he's wrong?"

"Protocol Zed," the synthesized voice replied.

Her hands on Dr. Occult tightened a little before she could stop them. "Understood. Wonder Woman out."

"Bad news?" Occult asked. He hadn't squirmed, even as her fingers had dug into his flesh.

"Superman is rampaging," she said flatly, translating code blue. "Whatever was done to his mind is keeping him from recognizing reality-"

"And he's acting out his delusions," Occult finished. "And you had hoped I would-?"

"I don't know," Diana replied honestly. "Batman determined you were the right person to contact, and he has been in contact with J'onn."

"Of course he has." The matter-of-factness of Occult's tone surprised her; the rumor mill must be more efficient than she realized. Or maybe he was just commenting on Batman's mythic reputation for having a plan, and it wasn't a comment on Bruce's relationship with J'onn at all.

Smallville came into view, and they lighted easily on the empty heliopad beside the hospital. Aquaman was waiting for them. He extended a hand to Dr. Occult. "Good to see you again, Dr. Occult."

Dr. Occult returned the handshake and bowed his head a little. "Your highness. A bit far from your kingdom, aren't you?"

Aquaman raised his head to squint at the noon sky. "A bit, but when duty requires-" he shrugged. His eyes shifted now to Diana. "Oracle reports a code blue."

Diana nodded. "I don't know any more than you do. Batman thinks that Dr. Occult will be able to do something from here, but-"

"Yes," Aquaman cut her off. He turned toward the hospital. "Whatever made the attack also affected a man here."

"Oh, really?" Dr. Occult sounded more interested than he had when Diana revealed the situation. "That's unusual for a telepathic assault. And Superman was hit on the moon?"

"In Wyoming," Wonder Woman supplied.

"And there were no other instances between here and there?"

"Not that we know of." Arthur held the door for both Dr. Occult and Diana. Without a helicopter drop off, the hall was almost eerily quiet, and Aquaman had them into a private room before they encountered anyone.

"Diana!" Martha Kent greeted with genuine warmth. "It is so good to see you again!" The older woman gave the Amazon a hug. "Do you have news about Clark?"

Diana shot a look at Arthur who gave the tiniest head shake. "I brought Dr. Occult here about that. A... mutual friend thinks -"

"He's right," Dr. Occult announced from beside the sleeping Jonathan Kent. He had removed his fedora and now looked at Mrs. Kent. "I am sorry, ma'am, but time is of the essence. I'll introduce myself properly when I return." He fished something out of his coat pocket and suddenly disappeared.

Martha Kent blinked and looked from Diana to Arthur. "My! I just can't keep up with you kids."

Diana smiled wryly, trying not to think about why time was of the essence. "How is Jonathan?"

Martha waved her hands. "The doctors have no idea what's wrong with him, but I'm inclined to agree with Arthur that he'll be fine with rest. It was so good of you to come sit with me, dear."

"It is my pleasure," the Atlantean replied, and Diana sensed his sincerity. She wondered how he was keeping hydrated. Her effort to not think about what might or might not be happening on the moon was interrupted by the buzz of her comlink in her ear.

The Amazon smiled ruefully. "I'm afraid I cannot stay," she apologized. "There are things I need to attend to."

"Of course, dear," Martha Kent accepted, settling in the chair by Jonathan's bed. "Take Arthur with you. He has been good to me, but he misses his ocean."

Aquaman hesitated. "Are you sure?"

Martha Kent gave him a sharp look, and the country politesse faded from the scene as she reached to turn on a transistor radio that Diana had not realized was there. Lex Luthor's voice filled the small hospital room.

"...teams have been deployed globally. We remind people to boil water before drinking it even if your area has been spared the worst of this catastrophe. Where phone and radio communications remain possible, we ask people to leave the lines free for emergency personnel. ... People of the world, we have confirmation that the attack on our planet is finally over. Although we must thank the members of the superhero community for finally vanquishing the threat brought upon us by their enemies, we must rely on ourselves to ..."

Martha turned off the radio. "If my son were able to, he'd be out there. He would not thank me for detaining you when the world still needs you. Off with you, both of you," she shooed.

Another buzz sounded in Diana's ear, more insistent. "Arthur, let's go. Give my best to Jonathan when he wakes."

"I will, Diana, dear. Good bye."

"Good bye," Arthur echoed, and he followed Diana from the room.

She waited until they were outside to answer he comlink. "Wonder Woman reporting."

"Never mind," the Oracle was saying, whether to Wonder Woman or someone else, Diana wasn't sure. But her next words were clearly for Diana. "You're needed in Calcutta. Drop Aquaman in the nearest reservoir. We need his help stabilizing aquifers."

Diana turned to Arthur, but he had keyed into the JLA channel and was already answering. "Understood. Did Dr. Occult make it?"

There was the briefest hesitation. "Uncertain. Green appears to have regained an upper hand."

"Oracle-" Diana began.

"No details yet," Oracle cut her off, "but we need you to help sift rubble in Calcutta. We need to get to Lantern."

Diana's brow furrowed as she caught Aquaman under the arms and began lifting him into the sky. "Get to Lantern?"

For an impatient moment she thought Oracle had closed her link, but then Kyle's voice came weakly over the line. "Hello, Wonder Woman. You en route?"

Aquaman touched her arm and pointed down toward a large body of water on the Kansas plain. She nodded and dropped lower. "I will be in about 5 seconds. Where are you?"

"Oh, somewhere," he replied vaguely. Then his tone seemed to sharper, become more focused. "In Calcutta. I got cold cocked by a building."

Diana released her hold on Aquaman and watched him disappear into the water. Then she coordinated herself to the most direct route to India. "So shrug it off," she suggested, guessing from Kyle's drifting tone that Oracle had connected them at least in part to keep Green Lantern talking.

"I'm working on it," he answered, matching her light tone. "Lots of survivors in the air pockets above me, though. Gotta keep..."

"Lantern! I'm en route. Talk to me!" she snapped as the Eastern Seaboard slipped away beneath her.

"Sorry. Head hurts. I told the ring to keep the air pockets open no matter what. I promised..."

She imagined him under tons of rubble, who knew how badly hurt, maintaining a network of open spaces so hundreds of scared people wouldn't die but unable to muster the energy to free them. "I'm almost there," she told him. "You'll keep your promise."

"Thanks," he answered, his voice weakening again. "Stupid building," he muttered.

"We'll take care of it." Below her, the blue of the Atlantic was giving way to the coast of Africa. "We will."

End part 19

************************************

Mindstorm, part 20By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0" Images and events from Pokolistan derived from Action Comics #803-805. 

Dr. Richard Occult was tired. In the space of four hours, he had interrupted a long sojourn in Faerie and its requisite privation in order to fight a life and death battle for the Earth. He had personally evacuated 85% of the population to Philadelphia to the outer suburbs. More exhausting, he had transported three of his colleagues to Gemworld despite grave misgivings. Then, just as it seemed the battle might be over, he had received word to wait for Wonder Woman in order that he might address some new crisis too secret to discuss over the comlink.

The snark at the back of his mind spoke in John Constantine's irritating accent. "That's what all your do-gooding gets you, mate. More trouble."

Like Constantine was one to talk.

When he had heard why Wonder Woman was collecting him, he understood the reason for secrecy. Superman was suffering some kind of delusions, was rampaging on the moon. That was definitely not news that should be generally known. It was bad enough when they had only thought Superman was off-planet and unable to help. If anyone thought for a moment he might return to earth as a threat?

Still, he wasn't certain what he could do about the situation until he had arrived in Smallville and been escorted to the hospital room housing that older couple.

Dr. Occult was a mystic, wise in the ways of magic. He was also the product of some of the finest schools in the world, savvy of the world of science and its edges. He was not a telepath, but what had happened to Superman was not telepathy in the strictest sense. As soon as he entered the hospital room, he could almost *taste* the truth. The mind of the sleeping man had been a lair.

The creature who had dwelt there, a being somewhere between the planes of magic and science, was gone. However, it had left its scent - and a trail. He wasted no time, turning from the bed only long enough to apologize to the man's wife (or only lover? Intimate friend in any case) for his rudeness. Then he slipped the Symbol of the Seven from his pocket and headed down the rabbit hole.

It was Rose Psychic who emerged from the other end, stumbling slightly on the broken pavement. She caught her balance and straightened her skirt and hat. In the distance, she could hear the *krump* of mortar fire, and the red sky flickered as if with heat lightning. "Great, Richard," she remarked with more fondness than irritation, "just drop me in a war zone." She imagined his answering chuckle and some remark that he had done his share of fighting for the day. She didn't allow herself the reflexive longing to actually hear his voice; they had been fused for so long she could box the emotion to deal with another time. Right now, she was on the hunt.

Or not.

Just there, across the street, was a cafe. She squared her shoulders and picked her way across the shattered asphalt with as much confidence as the uneven surface would allow her in her neat heels. Her quarry did not even look at her until she pulled out a chair at the same table as the other woman.

Rose flagged a waiter for coffee. He disappeared into the interior of the cafe.

Across from her, the other woman scowled. "I didn't summon you."

Rose smiled easily, picking up the teaspoon at her setting to keep her hands busy. "No," she confirmed.

Her casual demeanor drew a penetrating stare from midnight blue eyes. "You're not one of mine."

"No."

The waiter brought Rose her coffee, and she smiled at him. There was a packet of sugar on the saucer, and his eyes drifted unsubtly to her silk clad legs. She understood the gesture, and she pulled her legs more pointedly under the table's surface. The waiter looked disappointed, but he moved on. It felt like World War II, when rationing had made such small gifts more meaningful and a girl could be bought by such gestures. In fact, this whole scenario...

She looked around more carefully, observing the buildings that remained standing. "Pokolistan?"

The blue eyes examining her had not wavered. "Are you from Him?"

Rose took a sip of coffee. Ersatz, in keeping with the surroundings. "I belong to myself."

The sounds of battle drew closer. Neither Rose nor her companion paid any attention. "So I see. But He sent you."

Rose set her cup back in its saucer. It needed the sugar, but she would leave the packet untouched. "I can't tell if you're talking about your oppressor or your knight in shining armor."

Surprise flared in the other woman's eyes before they narrowed in suspicion. "You are not a construct." Above them, the battle noises grew deafening.

Rose tipped her head back to see past the brim of her hat. "Interesting," she noted. "I recognize the one in the blue, but the red?"

"I found him in here," the other woman shrugged. "General Zod, I think he's called. Apparently my imagination was not sufficient to complete my task. I should've started with native materials."

The two aerial combatants slammed into one another, and the teacups rattled in their saucers. "Impressive," Rose acknowledged. "Although I would prefer not to shout."

The other woman waved her hand negligently, and the two fighters disappeared. "I can finish later. After I understand what you are."

Rose smiled sweetly. "My name is Rose." She held out her hand. "And you?"

The other woman considered for a moment before accepting the handshake. "Bette."

"Very well, Bette. What would you like to know?"

Bette flagged the waiter for more coffee. "How did you get here?"

"I walked. Followed you, actually. You left a trail from Kansas."

The waiter approached, and both women waited as he filled their cups. If he noted the untouched sugar packet on Rose's saucer, he made no reaction.

"So you are not a telepath, then," Bette stated matter-of-factly.

"Naturally not." Rose waved to the surrounding city and sky. "A telepath could not penetrate into this anyway. Watch it, perhaps, but not enter."

A new expression, something like hope, crossed Bette's face. "Really?"

"You sound surprised. Didn't you create this?"

Bette shook her head. "I started it, but when I first arrived here- You are certain no telepath could enter?"

"Positive," Rose confirmed.

For the first time since they had met, Bette's shoulders slumped in a posture of defeat. "Then I am truly alone." Above them, the red sky deepened toward midnight, phasing through a magnificent shade of violet that Rose felt she should remember for Richard before settling into a normal night sky.

"I am here," Rose pointed out.

"Can you take me out of here?"

Rose hesitated. She could see Bette's aura, but her instincts told her that it was not something the Symbol of the Seven could hold on to, even if Richard had been there to wield it. Bette spoke before she could voice her negative.

"That's what I thought. I am here until the one who sent me here decides he wants me somewhere else, or until Jones comes back for me. But if no telepath can enter..."

"J'onzz sent you here?"

Bette gave Rose an irritated look. "No. He would never. He would have stopped it." Her face dropped so it was hidden by the veil of her hair. "If He remembered me."

Rose sat back in her chair and drank more coffee. Gas lights shone pleasantly on cobbled streets, no longer broken by war. The guns in the distance were silent. She considered Bette for a while. "I know J'onzz," she finally revealed.

Bette's eyes shot up angrily, and there were traces of tears on her cheeks. "You said He didn't send you!" she accused.

"He didn't," Rose answered calmly, "but he is near."

Bette stood and crossed to the wrought iron railing that surrounded the outdoor tables. Her fingers were white knuckled as she grasped the metal and looked out into the night. "I knew it! I knew it when I first arrived here and felt traces of him everywhere. It was like he was mocking me. It confused me, threw me off my mission! You're a BASTARD, JONES! YOU HEAR ME?" she shouted. "A FUCKING BASTARD!"

Her voice left silence behind it, punctuated by the chirping of one brave cricket. "Feel better?" Rose asked.

"No." Bette returned to her chair and sat with a sigh. "He left me in Trapps. 'A tough town run by a tough man,' he told me." She gave a short, barking laugh. "We got along all right, though. Jones left me to keep it all in check -" Now she wasn't bothering to hide her tears. "Trapps wasn't tough enough. Black got me anyway."

"Black?"

Bette nodded. "Jones weakened me with his deal. Black took advantage of it. He peeled me out of Trapps, held me bodiless for so long -"

"You're a psychic entity," Rose suddenly understood. "Your body-"

"Destroyed. I was at Black's mercy. If Jones would've come back-"

"He didn't know," Rose murmured, not knowing if it were true or not, but recognizing a useful hook for a dangerously unstable mind.

"Where is he now?" Bette demanded. "You said he's near."

Rose considered. "I cannot bring you to him, and I am not certain I can bring him here. Perhaps if you return control of this mind -"

"Black will kill me."

"He is a telepath?"

Bette nodded.

"Then he cannot reach you any more than J'onzz can. And J'onzz is closer."

Bette's lower lip trembled. "I can't."

Rose finished her last swallow of coffee. "Then I cannot help you," she decided, rising to her feet.

"Wait, no!" Bette cried.

Rose hesitated.

"I - I can make it easier. Reign in the nightmares. But I collapse this world - I have nowhere to go."

"And if I can bring you Jones?"

Bette was silent.

"Bette?"

"I will go. He will find me a place."

Rose wasn't sure whether to be warmed or chilled by Bette's faith, but she understood it. "I will do my best to bring him, then," she promised, meaning it. She didn't look back as she stepped through the fabric of Bette's world and gave control of her own soul back to Dr. Occult.

End part 20

***********************************

Mindstorm, part 21By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0"

Ramilla Chaterjee opened her eyes.

Everything was green.

For a confused moment, she reviewed everything she knew about color perception in animals, wondering what species had eyes that received only green. Then she scowled for half-understood precepts of the religion she had never been properly taught. Reincarnation was not supposed to include consciousness of past lives.

It was only as she began wondering how she had messed up her life so as to travel *down* the reincarnation ladder that she realized she was not, in fact, dead. 

She blinked.

Still green.

She moved one arm, and then the other. Then her feet and legs. All seemed to be working. She turned her head.

Rubble.

Everywhere.

Overhead, underfoot - she bit back a sudden, comprehending scream.

She was entombed. She had been helping with the rescue efforts, putting her med student training to work because even that was better than nothing for dealing with the stream of injured being uncovered in the wreckage of the former University Tower. Then the moon had raced across the sky and back again, and there were earthquakes and ...

And Green Lantern had been standing beside her, unwaveringly continuing to uncover the living and the dead. He had turned to her at one moment in the worst of it. "Let me worry about keeping you safe," he had said. "So long as the moon doesn't plunge down on top of us, I can cover you. Promise."

Everything was still green. He had kept his word. He had held open enough space for her to breathe and move and not be another human smear in the remains of Calcutta.

But where was he?

She wriggled out from under the slab of concrete that hovered six inches from her face. There was more space to her left, room to actually sit up at least. Her sense of claustrophobia eased as she cleared the slab and found head room. She sucked in a huge breath of relief as she raised herself to a sitting position.

The move left her dizzy, and she rested against the slab that should have had her name on it but for the green bubble she was in.

"... close off... Zod... make move..."

Ramilla jerked her head up. She wasn't alone. She squinted through the green in the direction of the voice she heard.

"...keep ... no, not... let..."

The green didn't give off much light, but it was enough for her to finally pick out the prone figure pinned a short distance from her. "Mr. Lantern?" she hazarded.

She thought she saw him twitch, and he stopped mumbling.

Twisted rebar stretched between them, but there was space to squirm through. Ramilla considered for a moment, acutely aware of her protecting dome of green. She had a sinking feeling it was finite, and it would not be in her best interests to go beyond its confines.

Reaching a hand out toward the crumpled figure beyond the rebar confirmed her fears. An accidental press against the twisted metal suddenly filled the space around Green Lantern with a cascade of dust and fine gravel.

She jerked back, eyes wide as she prayed to any random deity that might listen that she had not just killed the man who saved her. For the first time in her life, she wished her parents had not been such good secularists. 

She had no idea how much time passed before the air cleared again. It felt like forever, but was probably seconds. Green Lantern was still lying there, face bloodied and torso caught less under than between protruding chunks of concrete and steel.

"Mr. Lantern," she called again.

He groaned.

"Mr. Lantern," she tried again. She tried reaching out again, this time weaving her hand through the rebar with the utmost caution. She could just reach one of his hands.

"Mr. Lantern," she said once more, closing her fingers over his palm.

He grasped her fingers and his head moved.

"Mr. Lantern, wake up please," she begged.

That got her a groan and an indistinct, "Wha-?"

"The high rise crashed over us," she explained, not sure he would understand a word she said, but she needed to say it. "You saved me."

His head rolled and she realized he was trying to look at her. "Who-"

"My name's Ramilla. I was helping with the rescue. You said you would cover me, remember?"

"Ramilla." She couldn't really make out his face. The angle was wrong to see his expression even as he craned his neck. "Calcutta." He said it like it was a realization.

"Yes," she confirmed. "There was a bombing and then the moon-"

"Right," he cut her off, and she saw him start to move and then heard him hiss between his teeth. "Well, looks like I forgot to cover my own head," he remarked. "Are you okay?"

"I'm scared," Ramilla answered honestly.

"I don't blame you," he replied, and his hand once again tightened around her fingers. "I wonder..." his voice trailed off, and his grip loosened.

"Mr. Lantern?" she prompted nervously.

There was a long pause, followed by a weak laugh. "Why not Mr. Green? Green is nice..."

"Mr. Lantern," she demanded more firmly, pinching his hand.

"Ow! What - " He stopped, and his hand flexed. "I'm sorry. I'm trying to - but I can't get -"

A sudden electronic crackle sounded, and Green Lantern ripped his hand from Ramilla's, clutching at his head. The volume of the sound decreased, and in the enclosed space, Ramilla thought she could hear a tinny voice saying, "Lantern, can you read me?"

"Cavalry?" he queried, and Ramilla knew he wasn't talking to her. 

She could still hear the other voice, but it was now too quiet to distinguish words. "Kinda have a building problem right now, actually... reminds me..." he chuckled weakly.

A sharpness seemed to enter the tinny voice. "Did we win yet?" Green Lantern asked.

"Under the building," he continued after another pause. "I told you... Yeah. ... That ... yes. Good idea... Hello, Wonder Woman. You en route?"

Ramilla felt a pained knot in her chest start to loosen. Rescue. Whatever else was going on in the world, there was hope of rescue. She sharpened her attention on Green Lantern's words.

"Oh, somewhere," he said, and Ramilla stretched her fingers toward him. 

"Calcutta, Mr. Lantern. Tell them-"

He heard her. He couldn't look at her, but he must have felt her reach, because his hand returned comfortingly to hers as he spoke. "In Calcutta. I got cold cocked by a building."

He paused and for a second she worried he was fading out again, but it seemed he was listening. His tone was almost light when he started speaking again. "I'm working on it. Lots of survivors in the air pockets above me, though." He squeezed Ramilla's hand. "Gotta keep..." he trailed off.

There was an audible squawk from whatever communication device he was using.

Green Lantern shook his head. "Sorry. Head hurts. I told the ring to keep the air pockets open no matter what."

That settled it, Ramilla decided. She would find religion when she got out of this. How was she so lucky to be the beneficiary of this man's foresight - foresight that had saved her life?

Green Lantern was still speaking. "I promised...Thanks." The last word was weak, tired. She wondered how much it was taking for him to keep her and how many others alive. She stroked his palm, the only comfort she could offer. His thumb brushed the back of her hand in acknowledgement. "Stupid building," he muttered.

Absurd as it was, she knew exactly how he felt.

End part 21

*****************

Mindstorm, part 22By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0"

Once upon a time, John Jones, Denver cop, had been on assignment with his partner, Diane Mead. They were policing one of Denver's summer carnivals, conspicuously in uniform, ostensibly deterring petty thieves. They'd made a couple of minor arrests, but it had ended up being light duty on a pleasant day.

Until John messed it up.

Over the course of the day, they had passed several game booths. The one that had caught John's eye was a hand-eye coordination game. A length of copper tubing had been bent and twisted and affixed to a block of wood. Circling the copper was a loop of nickel wire, just a fraction larger than the diameter of the pipe, attached to a wooden handle. Current ran through the metal, and if the nickel and copper came in contact, the game would produce a loud buzz. The trick was to run the loop of wire the length of the copper tubing without causing the machine to buzz.

All day, John had noticed person after person fail the task. Apparently, Diane had noticed John noticing, because as their shift ended, she had steered them to the tent housing that game. She had challenged him, bet him a dollar he couldn't do it. He had resisted, arguing that he wasn't interested, but he had betrayed himself. He only realized when Diane began staring at him that his idle hands had traced the wire loop along the tubing three times. In complete distraction, he had performed an action that human beings could not manage with complete concentration.

The carny running the booth had made unpleasant accusations of cheating. Diane had defended John even as she hustled her bewildered partner from the tent and back to the squad car. Once on the way back to the station, though, she had nothing to say to him. 

John was reminded again how alien he really was, how badly he had let his facade slip. But in truth, he hadn't realized until then just how completely different - how limited - human consciousness was.

Today's events made him appreciate, though, the kind of concentration that the carnival game required of human beings.

Inside Superman's mind, something had exploded. Something had sought to reorder everything in Kal-El's psyche. J'onn wasn't sure why it hadn't instantaneously demolished his friend's mind, but it hadn't. It had moved slowly enough for J'onn to create an elaborate balancing act that was, for a Martian, the equivalent of a human trying to prevent a loop of nickel wire from coming into contact with the copper tubing it encircles.

J'onn had managed - for a while. He had successfully protected the core of Superman's mind from the delusions created by his attacker. He could not give Kal-El control of his own body, though. The effort to keep mind, delusion, and physical reaction from interacting was a mental trick that no telepath could manage for long. When something finally had to give, J'onn made a choice.

He sent Lois away and sealed himself into the Observation Deck with Superman. He could still save Kal-El's mind, but he would have to allow him to act out the delusion.

It was a hard thing to battle a friend, even one who was supposedly invulnerable. And it wasn't as if J'onn could fight an entirely defensive battle. He needed to play according to the script in Superman's delusion as much as possible, and he needed to ensure that the only target Superman had was J'onn. There could be no collateral damage.

The stakes were high.

If it came to it, J'onn would kill Superman.

He didn't allow his mind to shy from that truth as he slammed a fist into Superman's jaw, ensuring he still had the Man of Steel's attention. The Watchtower rocked under the impact of Superman's body, and a red light flooded the medbay as Superman roared and surged toward J'onn again. Hull breach.

J'onn was not anxious to take this battle into space. Kal-El's tolerance for the vacuum was remarkably high, but he was still subject to negative effects if exposed to it for too long. J'onn would undoubtedly outlast him, and out there he would not be vulnerable to-

FIRE! His mind was almost instantly caught by it as he dodged Superman's heat vision. The chaos started to surge through his thoughts, threatening the limited protection he was still able to give Kal-El's mind. It was the risk to Kal-El that let J'onn focus enough to aim his own Martian vision at the small breach and make it bigger, to make the slow leak of atmosphere into a gale force departure of air.

The fire flickered out. Superman did not budge as a steel cabinet slammed into him and bounced to one side. A bed crashed into the wall, its form twisting and distorting and ... plugging the hole.

Superman smiled unpleasantly and moved in again. J'onn mirrored his movement, his senses on high alert. His head was still clouded by the echo of flames, but clarity of purpose replaced clarity of thought. He had to contain Superman. Period. Contain, or maim, or kill. 

Superman's breath was visible in the now thinned air, and that realization seemed to inspire the Kryptonian. A sudden gust of icy breath blasted over J'onn's body. Fortunately there was not enough humidity in the air to form an even temporary sheath of ice around J'onn, which would have been the only thing that could even have slowed the Martian. He took advantage of Superman's confidence in his attack to aim a tackle at the other alien.

They crashed together with concussive force, J'onn's momentum sending them tumbling through the debris that had collected at the far end of the medbay. There were metal screams and crashing sounds as their bodies destroyed the already mangled equipment. They finally came to a halt in a jumble of limbs from which J'onn instantly extricated himself, ready for the next blow.

Superman didn't move. His eyes were open, staring blankly, his mouth rounded into an "o" that might have been surprise. 

J'onn remained guarded, prepared for anything.

Slowly, Kal-El rocked his body forward, half-rising before falling to his knees in an attitude of prayer. Tears began to flow from his eyes.

Warily, J'onn stretched out his consciousness, reaching into the delusion that seemed to have coiled in on itself. He caught fractured images, a bridge, Lois, a heated battle between Superman and some adversary, a coffin...

J'onn remained carefully alert as he reached to Kal-El's mind. *Not real,* he reminded his friend, even as he prepared for the backlash from this new delusion. Superman would not remain quietly grief ridden. It was not in his character to accept death easily.

But Kal-El did not stir, did not even brush at the freezing water on his cheeks. The next movement came from an entirely unexpected source.

With no warning or fanfare, Dr. Occult appeared out of thin air.

And into it. J'onn responded instantly to the gasp of surprise as Occult found himself in the depleted atmosphere of the medbay, wrapping himself around the mystic and pressing a hand over the man's nose and mouth, concentrating the oxygen remaining in the air and filtering it through his body so Occult could breathe. After a startled several seconds, Occult began to shimmer in his grip and shift out of phase, the Symbol of the Seven clutched in his fist.

J'onn stepped back as Dr. Occult faded to ghost-like insubstantiality. "It seems to be one of those days," the mystic remarked dryly.

"You are all right?" J'onn asked.

"Startled, but certainly better than our friend here. You?"

"Likewise," J'onn answered, "and I take it you-?"

"I was in his mind, yes. Talking with Bette."

J'onn's eyes widened.

"I see the name means something to you."

"Bette Noir," J'onn stated, reading confirmation on Occult's face. His mind raced back to when he had last seen the psychic entity, months - too many months - before. "She is supposed to be-"

"In Trapps, whoever or whatever that is. She told me."

"I thought - what -"

"A telepath called Black. She thinks he'll kill her, and I got the sense it wasn't a misplaced fear."

"A telepath-" J'onn thought back, finding in memory the group that called themselves "the Elite" and the firestorm of publicity they had garnered for their take-no-prisoners approach to supervillains. "Manchester Black."

Dr. Occult's face flickered in sudden recognition. "Wasn't he supposed to be-?"

"Incarcerated. Top level security, STAR Labs dampening equipment..." J'onn felt his mind rushing through possibilities, then he paused. "Wait. How did you end up -?"

"I followed Bette. From Kansas."

"Kansas," J'onn repeated. Jonathan Kent. "She was in Kansas?"

"Long enough to make a lair." Dr. Occult was studying Superman. "She said she would reign in the nightmares. It doesn't look like-"

"Compared to what was going on before, this is an improvement," J'onn interrupted, mentally cursing himself. There had been a conversation - over a year ago? A night on monitor with Superman when Clark had revealed that his father had been not quite the same since the Imperiex war. J'onn had offered to do a telepathic scan, and Clark had declined. Had J'onn insisted -

This was getting him nowhere. He stretched out his mind, reaching out a telepathic link. He gritted his teeth against the spike of pain that the action caused; need had distracted him from how badly he had abused his abilities. *Batman, Flash.*

*J'onn! We can't get the audio! What the-*

*Report, J'onn,* Batman overrode the Flash, his mental presence solid and anchoring.

*Superman's mind has been invaded by a psychic entity. I've run into her before.*

*Her?* That was the Flash.

*Bette Noir. She was hosted by Dr. Trapps in a secure facility last I checked on her over a year ago. Before the Imperiex war. Dr. Occult suggests she has been nesting in Mr. Kent's mind since the war.*

*I'm pulling files on Trapps,* Batman stated.

*Pull up files on Manchester Black, as well,* J'onn directed. *He's behind this somehow.*

*Isn't he supposed to be-?* Flash started.

*Luthor.* Even through the mental link, Batman's tone was icy.

*Possibly,* J'onn cautioned.

*Definitely. That's the missing piece.*

"J'onn?" Dr. Occult's voice held a note of concern, and J'onn felt the wispy brush of the mystic's hand against his shoulder. J'onn blinked, realizing belatedly he had sagged to one knee, was close to mimicking Superman's posture.

*I can't maintain the link,* J'onn confessed. *Wally, try to get communications-*

*Already working on it,* Wally promised, and J'onn realized he probably had the video feed. *Do what you have to do.*

*J'onn out,* he projected before severing the link. He looked blearily at Dr. Occult. "You were saying about one of those days?"

"I'm guessing you were in contact with someone outside this room and not being attacked?"

J'onn staggered to his feet. "I apologize. I should have -"

Dr. Occult shook his head. "Remember the company I keep. What next?"

J'onn thought for a moment. "Tell me everything Bette told you." He would get to the bottom of this, and someone was going to pay.

End part 22

********

Mindstorm, part 23By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0"

"Who the hell-?" Lois asked in confusion as the battle raging in the medbay suddenly and inexplicably stopped. She stared as J'onn pulled out of the wreckage and enveloped the trench-coated man who had appeared from nowhere. She thought J'onn was restraining the newcomer, but in seconds, the two beings separated again. Clark still hadn't moved from his knees.

Wally paused in his more or less constant motion and turned his attention back to the medbay monitor. "Hey, Dr. Occult!" he exclaimed in something like relief. His hands flashed across the keyboard, and he spoke into the open comlink: "Batman, Dr. Occult has arrived. Blue seems neu-" he paused, glancing back at the screen and at Lois - "unthreatening."

Lois heard the word he cut off anyway. Neutralized. It wasn't the right word. Superman - Clark - looked defeated. Despairing. 

Batman's growl filtered through the monitor womb speakers. "Get me connected, Flash."

Lois wasn't sure how Wally answered steadily. There was no irritation in his tone as he replied, "I'm working on it. I've only got visuals up here as it is, but I'll see if I can at least get you that much. Oracle's got word on Lantern?"

"Wonder Woman hasn't got him dug out yet," a synthesized voice cut in. "I doubt..."

Lois stopped listening, focusing on the jumpy image from the medbay. J'onn and this "Dr. Occult" were obviously talking, their faces giving away moments of realization and surprise. Neither was paying more than passing attention to Superman, still kneeling amidst tangled metal and looking devastated.

A sudden snap of electricity and a shower of sparks startled her attention back to Wally. "Damn it!" he was muttering, shaking one hand and blowing on his fingers as he returned to the control console. Lois noticed a black streak along the fabric of the suit halfway to his elbow.

He glanced at the medbay feed. "I've got a clearer image up here. That help down below?"

"Affirmative," Batman's voice replied. "What-"

Batman suddenly stopped speaking, and Lois' eyes widened in alarm as Wally grew suddenly glassy-eyed. "Wally?"

She was half relieved when he held up a stilling hand. "J'onn," he murmured, turning back to the console silently in the attitude of one listening intently.

Telepathic link, Lois realized, looking back at the medbay monitor. J'onn looked... pale, if that was possible for a Martian, his eyes unfocused. The man in the trench coat, Dr. Occult, seemed to have the same realization. He began studying Superman, not appearing to offer comfort or to be doing anything at all. It wasn't fair to be angry at him, Lois knew, but he was there, where she couldn't be. The least he could do was-

He spun suddenly, his attention abruptly returning to J'onn just as the Martian toppled forward, landing heavily on one knee and swaying precipitously. Dr. Occult reached for J'onn's shoulder, and Lois shuddered as the insubstantial hand faded through Martian flesh rather than actually touching it. She saw Occult's lips move, forming the word, "J'onn."

The sound seemed to stabilize J'onn, and he stopped swaying. Another moment, and he turned his face to look at Dr. Occult, his mouth moving, but he was turned half away from the camera and-

"I'm still working on audio," Wally's voice interrupted her thoughts. "Teleportation is totally out, though, at least for a bit."

"Understood. We'll work on locating Black. Batman out."

Lois looked from the medbay screen to the Flash. Black. "Manchester Black?" she asked.

Wally looked as if he had forgotten she was there. "Yeah. J'onn says he has been herding a psychic entity around, broke her out of her host and stuck her in Jonathan Kent's mind during the Imperiex War."

"Manchester Black." The answer had been in front of her the whole time. "Fuck!"

Wally's half-diverted focus shifted fully to her. "Lois?"

"The Masters' assassination. Shit. Wally, get me Batman."

Credit the Flash for understanding when something was an order, she reflected, her eyes going back to the medbay monitor for the two seconds it took Wally to get a line back to the planet.

"Report, Flash," Batman's demanded.

"Batman, Lois needs to talk to you. Something about the Masters' assassination?"

"Go ahead, Lois."

Lois looked uncertainly at Wally. "The whole room is mic'ed. He can hear you."

"Oh," she blinked, taking a deep breath. "Batman, can you access my computer at the Planet?"

"Oracle can," he answered. "What are we looking for?"

"Manchester Black. He was being transported between STAR Labs facilities during the war when Masters ordered him diverted." She closed her eyes for a moment, wondering how she had been so clueless to the connection. "He was supposed to arrive at a facility in Wyoming -"

"Lois, we've hacked in. Where is this data?"

"I have it in a password protected folder, using Clark's encryption program. It's called 'Dear Edie Orchard.'"

"DEO," Batman acknowledged. "You have a source?"

Lois bit her lip. "I can't divulge-"

"Understood," Batman cut her off brusquely. "Flash, Green Lantern is not going to be able make any runs to the moon. Oracle is trying to locate-"

"Hold on, Batman." Lois cocked her head at the Flash, watching him do something at the console. "I think - J'onn, can you hear me?"

On the monitor, both J'onn and Dr. Occult looked up. "Go ahead, Wally."

"J'onn?" There was a hint of Bruce bleeding through Batman's tone.

"I'm here, Batman. You have news?"

"I think we might," Batman confirmed, and something in his voice made Lois believe everything might be okay.

End part 23

*****************

Mindstorm, part 24By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0"

Barbara Gordon was nurturing a world class tension headache. She had no time for it at the moment, but she knew it was lurking there, just waiting for her to think about it for even a split second.

She would allow herself that luxury when she could also afford to sleep it off - hopefully sometime before the next major supervillain effort to take over or destroy the world.

In the meantime, her fingers flashed over two keyboards and her eyes tracked data on multiple monitor screens. A corner of her attention was tuned to her comlink, listening for further news. Thankfully, the UN's world disaster preparedness plan had kicked in smoothly, the Luthor-pressed adjustments making the whole process much smoother than it had in the aftermath of the Martian god thing. Communications were coming back on line, and Mr. Terrific, Josiah Powers, the Janissary, Wonder Woman and Dr. Light were taking on continental coordination duties for the various pockets of superheroes scattered across the globe.

Too much of that involved triage, a sorting of living from dead, the erection of temporary shelters, the running of medical supplies from place to place. 

It was really only a matter of hours before the long string of painful funeral and memorial services began.

Barbara could not afford to think about any of that, however. She had a very specific mission: find Manchester Black. She had already hacked the Daily Planet, a move that included the need to make known that she had already set up decryption programs that could handle anything Clark Kent had devised. Batman had not indicated any surprise, but she wanted to think he hadn't known how far she had previously hacked into JLA and other systems.

It was a foolish wish in a way; they played so much spy-counterspy with one another's systems that there was nothing in either Oracle's or Batman's computers that was unknown to the other. The *significance* of some things were perhaps not so readily discovered. Barbara, for instance, had barely paid attention when Batman had uploaded files regarding Bette Noir some months previously. She had noted it, but now she felt like she was playing catch up. Her only consolation was that it was clear that Batman had not gotten the information first hand; the file had all the hallmarks of hearsay from J'onn.

That was the one she needed to talk to. Who knew how much information J'onn decided was confidential and kept exclusively in his own mind according to some alien notion of discretion? Not that it would have made that much difference, she allowed. What had happened to Superman had required the intervention of Manchester Black, and no where in the files had anyone suggested that Bette Noir could be weaponized by a skilled telepath.

It had occurred to Luthor, though. It must have. Masters was so clearly a high level operative, nominally of the CIA, outside the loop of Checkmate but still...

No matter what else was true, the DEO answered to Luthor. Bones was a cagey bastard, probably deliberately set up the leak to Lois Lane, but he was still the director of a Federal agency. Hell, the DEO funneled metas into government employ, had responsibility for keeping a bead on every powered being on the planet. They knew about Bette Noir. It looked like they knew Bette Noir was potentially missing. 

Bette Noir was missing, and her captor, Trapps, had been transferred to a facility in Wyoming. Trapps was still there, ostensibly being studied by mind scientists who weren't there anymore, and Black had gone missing when he was supposedly being transferred to the same facility in Wyoming.

By Masters.

And none of this loop was getting her anywhere but angry and she *still* didn't have a bead on where Black might have disappeared to. The idea that such a high powered telepath was out there...

Her comlink pinged. "Oracle here."

"Where do you need me?"

Barbara blinked. "In the hospital, Lantern," she said sternly, "which better be where you're calling me from."

"Um-"

Barbara flipped to another window, engaging tracking software that showed Green Lantern's signal over the Pacific Ocean. She mentally cursed and sent a message to Vic Stone. "I'm sending Cyborg to meet you. Do NOT pass out over the damned ocean."

"I-"

"Concussion, Lantern. Don't play around. I don't appreciate having to divert resources to ground you, but I will do it."

"But you need someone - the teleporter -"

"I'm going to take you off the network, Lantern," she threatened. "I only left you live access so you could get news as it came, but so help me-"

A new alert sounded and she glanced at the computer. "Dammit," she muttered, closing out a set of programs that linked her to the complex in Wyoming. They had finally smelled hacker and were taking aggressive countermeasures. They wouldn't track her back, but still -

"Oracle-"

She ignored Kyle, irritated beyond words that world disaster was not distracting security attention enough for her to sneak through systems while at the same time granting the outfit in Wyoming some grudging respect. On another monitor, a message scrolled across from Vic, indicating he had a lock on Green Lantern and would get him safely somewhere.

"Lantern," she finally spoke, "don't fuss at Cyborg. I've got too much to worry about right now."

He sounded for an instant like he was going to object, then he gave her a subdued, "Okay. Lantern out."

A new signal went off, indicating a new stream of data from one of Batman's sources. Or rather, Oracle registered, the product of clue-hunting in tabloids. This was what they were reduced to. A final key punch released a diversion program that would completely scramble the trail back to her, defeating the counter hack initiated in Wyoming, and she turned her attention to the clustered, "I was mind controlled!" tabloid headlines, following the map pattern Batman had already produced. There were clear areas of concentration, but-

"Batman. Oracle." That was the Flash, sounding deliberately calm. "Has J'onn been in contact with either of you?"

"Report, Flash," Batman ordered.

"We finally got the atmosphere back under control in the medbay, and he just... took off."

Oracle flipped back to her tracking program. "I got nothing," she reported in frustration. "He's either not carrying his tracker or its signal isn't getting through the electromagnetic interference. Do you know where he was heading?"

"He went invisible on me," Wally explained. "He was talking to Dr. Occult, and then Lois got in there and they were getting Superman onto a bed and then - gone."

There was a click on the line and Barbara realized Batman had opened a new channel when he said, "Dr. Occult."

The mystic did not miss a beat. "I don't know where he went, Batman. We were speaking about Superman's state, and he asked if I felt I could deal with Bette if she reneged on our agreement. I said I could, and he implied he was scanning the planet-"

"Looking for Black," Barbara registered, staring hopelessly at her computer screens. Somewhere among her many muted audio feeds, another Presidential address was coming through, kicked up to audibility by some pre-programmed key word. She found her attention drifting to the sound as Batman thanked Dr. Occult and directed Wally to keep his attention on the teleporter problem.

"... about recognizing our limits along with our strengths..." Luthor was saying. She hated him for it, but the son of a bitch had a point.

End part 24

***********************

Mindstorm, part 25By Chicago

Disclaimers in "part 0" Aspects of Manchester Black's appearance taken directly from his last appearance in Action Comics #796. Be warned, bad language.

^^^

For what felt like the 20th time, J'onn found an intact medical bed and managed to settle Superman onto it. It was finally warm enough that the tears that still trickled down the Man of Steel's face neither froze nor steamed, and J'onn allowed himself a moment to test the atmosphere.

"We're back to human breathability if you want to return to this plane," he told Occult. "I'm going to reopen the hatch between here and the Monitor Womb."

Occult shimmered for a moment, then seemed to settle into solid form. He took a deep breath. "Impressive. I was not aware you could regenerate atmosphere so quickly up here. Martian technology?"

"In part," J'onn confirmed, crossing to the medbay communications console. "With additions from New Genesis and Thangar, and an upgrade from Zauriel that is almost beyond my physics. It irritates Batman," he added in afterthought, not really knowing why.

Occult chuckled as J'onn opened a channel to Wally. 

"Flash."

"Go ahead, Big Guy."

"Please let Lois know it is safe for her to be here. I am uncertain Kal will register her presence, but I can only imagine it will be easier for him if she is here."

"Got it." Over the comlink, J'onn could hear the synthesized voice announcing, "Observation Bay partition opening. Attention, Observation Bay..."

"J'onn out." He closed out the comlink signal and closed his eyes. He had been trying to reach through the chaos in Superman's mind to Bette, but it was to no avail. Even knowing she was there, it seemed Occult's assessment was correct. She was too frightened of Black to shift the mental landscape enough to reveal herself.

"J'onn?" Dr. Occult's hand on his shoulder was solid this time, his fingers gripping firmly.

J'onn shook himself and glanced back past Occult at Superman. "Bette thinks Black will know if she lets Superman out of her thrall."

Occult dropped his hand. "That is what she intimated to Rose, at any rate."

"I should have paid more attention," J'onn regretted, watching as Lois appeared at a near run through the medbay door.

"Where?" she asked breathlessly, then saw the lone bed standing amidst the devastated med bay. Occult crossed toward her, pulling an intact chair from one pile of battered equipment and settling it beside the bed.

Lois gave him a too-quick smile, her eyes fixed on her husband's face. "Oh, Clark, I'm here. What-?" She looked up at Occult and then toward J'onn, eyes asking explanation for the continuous stream of tears on her husband's face.

"The entity - Bette -" J'onn began heavily.

"She has created a mental landscape for him where he will not want to hurt anything," Occult picked up smoothly, his tone more reassuring than J'onn could manage. "She is under threat herself."

"From Black. Motherfucker," Lois spat, the obscenity laced with a level of vitriol that bounced against J'onn's depleted mental shields almost painfully.

J'onn resisted the urge to close his eyes again, to lean against something, to rest. Instead, he let Lois' emotion roll over him, feeling the sting of unintended blame. He could end this. He knew who was causing it. He knew who he was looking for. 

"Dr. Occult," he began, "you feel confident that Bette will uphold her end of your bargain?"

"If you can't get to her, neither can Black," Occult pointed out. "I don't see why she would break the deal. If we take care of Black, she has more to gain than lose."

J'onn nodded. "And if she does break the deal? Would you be able to-?"

"Contain her?" Occult finished. "Well enough, I think. Or at least meet her on the mental plane."

"J'onn, why-?"

"I am only thinking, Lois," J'onn reassured, stretching out his mind as he did so, reaching his consciousness out to the planet below, searching for-

*YOU!*

J'onn felt the telepathic force of another presence meeting his scan and staring back at him. Black. Fixing him with the telepathic equivalent of a stare and reaching out-

Without a second thought, J'onn went intangible and invisible, closing his mind thoroughly to any contact save Black's. *I am coming,* he warned, phasing through the Watchtower walls and flinging himself toward the Earth's atmosphere.

*You think you can stop me.* Black's tone was amused.

*I know I can,* J'onn replied grimly, sluicing through the stratosphere with arrow-straight directness.

*Really now? Tired as you are? I can feel the exhaustion from here.*

J'onn came from the north to avoid the fires blazing in Philadelphia. Metropolis was less dark than other cities between the Brainiac-13 tech and the widespread use of emergency generators. Not that J'onn need to see to find his target. *You will never be a match for me.*

"So you think, mate," Black said aloud as J'onn touched down in the grungy hotel room Black was staying in. He turned to face the Martian, a cigarette dangling from his lips and his hands holding a match ready to strike. "But I'll thank you to keep your distance anyway."

J'onn reached to the man's mind, only to find his focused probe batted away. "No you don't, J'onny boy. It's been a while since you've had a telepath anywhere near your skill to spar with, hasn't it? You've gotten sloppy."

"Let Bette go, Black."

Black raised an eyebrow and sat down on the dingy bedspread. He set the matchbook down and took his cigarette from his mouth to ash on the floor. "Now why should I do that? Especially when I could make you make me."

J'onn considered Black for a moment. The man's mental shields were solid; penetrating them would require more than J'onn felt he could afford. "You want me to fight you."

Black took another drag from his cigarette. "Why not? Telepath of your abilities is hard to find and you weren't around to engage me before."

"Before you became Luthor's pet?"

Black snorted. "Is that what you think? Superman really needs to keep you all in the loop better."

J'onn watched the tip of Black's cigarette glow cherry red for a moment. "You are operating on your own?"

"You really are extraordinarily stupid for someone of your reputation," Black pronounced, "but I kinda like you anyway, J'onny-boy." He fished a new cigarette from the pack on the end table. "I'll chain light this one."

J'onn concentrated. "Luthor coerced you."

"Ah, that's better!" Black dropped his old cigarette and ground it under his boot heel. "Never underestimate what a billionaire president can do with the chemical resources at his disposal. Or what sort of mad-ons he can provoke."

"Mad-on?" J'onn winced against a telepathic backlash.

"Now, none of that," Black chided. "But that was sneakier. Probably could get further in if you weren't concentrating on making sure I don't slip under your radar and trace back all the secrets in your pretty green head. But yes, mad-on. Luthor had me going. Why does Superman get the accolades? All this truth and justice bullshit, but no permanent solution to all these supervillains who come in and kill innocents by the dozens and hundreds."

"The Elite-"

"Don't start. Don't even go there," Black warned. "Superman broke us. The world broke us. Broke me. 'When I was a child... I dreamt of childish things...'"

"Black-"

A wall of telekinetic energy slammed against J'onn, pressing him back until he was against the thin plaster of the hotel room wall. "Feel that? You could've stopped that if you were in practice, if you weren't tired. Don't waste your fucking potential."

J'onn reached his mind out against the psychic snare, feeling the energy Black was expending, seeing the sweat on the man's brow as he maintained a facade of casualness. Black took another drag of his cigarette.

"Luthor wanted to take something right and good and pervert it, make himself a hero against the fall of Superman. Couldn't impeach him then. And he used me. Son of a bitch made me more of a villain than I had ever fought."

J'onn took a step forward, mind and hand reaching toward Black, sensing something in the man's mind. He flinched back as Black flicked the lit cigarette at him.

"You won't save me, mate," Black decreed, pressing his forefinger against his head and cocking his thumb like the hammer of a gun. J'onn realized too late that Black's hand was on the matchbook, that the telekinetic energy in the room was collecting and-

PABOOOM!

The force of the explosion blew out the windows, threw J'onn back in a wash of flame. The rush of wind past him as he fell was cold, and after the first few stories the flames were gone and -

Something slammed into him at high speed, and he was no longer falling. 

Correction, he realized, his mind fighting through the static the fire left in its wake. SomeONE.

"I've got you," Jesse Quick was saying. "The Tower's closest. Batman, Flash, Oracle, I've got him. I think he's mostly okay. Just singed. J'onn?"

"Tell them," he began, fighting the chaos in his mind, "tell them it's over." He closed his eyes, feeling the force of Manchester Black's memories, hurled at him along with the explosion that ended the man's life. He began to shake.

"Here we are," Jesse announced as she sped them to the medbay of Titans Tower. "Omen, one more for you." She turned to J'onn. "Next time," she said sternly, "stay away from fires. 3X2(9YZ)4A."

She was gone, and Omen was guiding him to a bed. "Dr. Mid-Nite says all I can do is make you rest..."

He stopped listening, fighting against the burnings and beatings that filled Black's memory, finding space to open his mind to the insistent calls from Ace. *Bruce,* he projected.

*We will talk,* Bruce sent back firmly, anger and worry commingled in his mental tone.

*Tell Occult to tell Bette-*

*She already knows. She is still in Superman's mind but has released him. Occult reports she will wait for you.*

J'onn closed his eyes as he settled back under Omen's guiding hands, giving in to her desire to see him lie down. *Then tell Lois-*

*J'onn. Rest. Batman out.*

It was more than J'onn could do to resist the sudden snap of Batman's primitive mental shields. The echo of fire still burned in his brain. With a sigh, he tuned his mind toward a meditative state, striving to forget, if only for a while, what made a man's heart turn against its own desire to do good.

end

********************


End file.
